Element Gang: Avatar: The Last Airbender, Book 1: Water
by Element Writer
Summary: Roku Tengen, a boy born in the Fire Nation, has discover that he is one of the two Avatars, the only people able to bend all four elements: air, water, earth, and fire. He and his group of friends must now travel to help him master the other three elements, traveling the world to find masters to teach him. Will they defeat the Fire Lord or will the world face fiery destruction?
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

 _Air. Water. Earth. Fire. A hundred years ago, all was right with the world. Prosperity and peace filled our days. The Four Nations: Air, Water, Earth, and Fire lived amongst each other in harmony. Great respect was afforded to all those who could bend their natural element. There were only two people who stand above the rest. Ones who could bend all four elements. These people were known as the Avatars. They were the only ones who could communicate with the Spirit World. With the Spirits' guidance, the Avatars kept balance in the world. But then, a hundred years ago, one of them had disappeared… Then the Fire Nation attacked. As part of their first assault, they attacked all the Air Nomad Temples and destroyed all the Airbenders. They brought a hundred years of destruction as they began their conquest of the world. As part of it, they killed my father for they found him as the other Avatar. In his study, I found an old airbending scroll. I began learning from it, only trying to pretend to be the Avatar. I kept this a secret due to living in the Fire Nation. The Fire Nation thought my father hid the other Avatar, so they searched everywhere in the Fire Nation for the next Avatar. The only person who knew about this was my old childhood friend Ty Lee. Every day, I would show her the airbending moves I learned. It always did bring out her glowing smile. Though I received a surprise one day when I was showing Ty Lee the tricks. From my last move, I actually…airbend. I talked to my mother and she told me how proud she was that I learned airbending. She then told me that the lineage of Avatars that my father was part of wasn't pasted down from one life to the next, but from parent to child. This was a secret kept only to me, my mother, and Ty Lee. After two months, I then saw it was too dangerous for me to stay in the Fire Nation. If they found out that I was the Avatar, they would surely kill me or threaten everyone close to me. I wrote a letter to Ty Lee, packed up everything, and fled from the Fire Nation. This was for the best. This world needed a hero and I was gonna make sure it got it. Though I didn't leave alone. My cousin Hiriko and Kioko joined me on this quest. When Hiriko learned the moves from the scroll, we found out she was an Airbender. It stood to reason that she was part of the lineage of a surviving Airbender, her powers only dormant until she learned from the sacred scroll. Kioko was also a Firebender and the silliest one of all. Once I had mastered airbending, we would then begin our journey to the Earth and Water Nation, where I would master earthbending and waterbending. Along the way, we also came across other benders who ran away from home. Tadaaki, an Earthbender, and Seiichi and Yosuke, Waterbenders from the Northern Water Tribe. They ran away to help protect their homes from the Fire Nation. After gaining their trust, we all then started traveling together. It wasn't long until I found out they were the members of the Element Gang, a team of elementals I was destined to lead. This only made our determination stronger as we continued to the other nations. But, one day, I felt something, like a calling. The next thing I knew, I found myself in a strange forest along with a dragon, who called me the Avatar and asked me where I was. I told it I had been distant and then asked what was going on and where I was. It then told me I was in the Spirit World and my true power had been awaken, but only for a short time. When I asked how it was awakened, it told me it meant only one thing: the other Avatar had returned. It told me to go, find him, and help him defeat the Fire Lord. After hearing that, me and my team then had a new part of our journey. First, we would help me master airbending, then we would go to find me people who could help me learn the other types of bending. Then, we would go and find the other Avatar. My name is Roku Tengen and I will master all of the elements and save the world with my team beside me. Avatar, where ever you are, we will find you and help you defeat the Fire Lord._


	2. Chapter 1: Fire Child

**Chapter 1: Fire Child**

There we were, traveling the woods of the Earth Nation and heading to the Southern Air Temple to try to find some airbending scrolls. The reason for this was because I hadn't mastered airbending completely. The scroll my father left me only got me a quarter way to mastery. The same went for Hiriko, which made her eager to get there. The reason we went down south was because the Southern Air Temple was the only one that the Fire Nation hadn't been searching the most, which gave us the advantage of getting the airbending scrolls and keeping out of Zuko's sight. We could fly there, but the Fire Nation was all over the place. We take flight and we could get caught in an instant. Had to keep hidden, travel by the shadows. So we traveled by foot, which Yosuke complained about. Nobody was gonna take anybody from the Fire Nation, especially to an abandoned Air Temple. I wanted to avoid Zuko because I knew he was hunting the Avatars, which would meant I would have to face him. My reason for this is because he was one of my oldest friends. Our history together began before I left the Fire Nation, back when I was a child.

It was after my father's burial and I was still coping with it. It really isn't the most uplifting when your own father dies on your birthday. I was so depressed that I didn't want to leave my room or even speak. Every time I would go to sleep, I would always have the same nightmare: my father dragged into darkness and me stuck in a ring of fire unable to help him. My mother, my sisters, Hiriko, and even Kioko tried everything to cheer me up, but I could never crack a smile or even leave my bed. How could I knowing my own father won't be able to see me grow up? My depression seemed endless. Then Prince Ozai asked my mother to bring me to the place where I would spend some time with his two children: his only son, Zuko, and his only daughter, Azula. Zuko was the oldest and would become the heir after his father ascended to Fire Lord. My cousin and Kioko joined to see the palace. I didn't much care so I allowed them to come. Though it didn't really seem that much. I really was still depressed.

With that, it made both Zuko and Azula curious why I was sitting around doing nothing while Hiriko and Kioko played in the garden. My mistake there was ignoring Azula when she constantly questioned me. I then saw Azula's rage and earned a black eye. I was lucky that Zuko managed to stop her before she completely pumbled me. He managed to help me up and apologized for his sister's actions. But I simply told him, without using a word, it was nothing and went back to my spot. Though I was now kinda a bit enlightened for what Zuko had done for me. Though I didn't smile. But then Kioko did one of her juggling acts with fire cakes. It ended after she bumped into Zuko and the cakes landed on top of them. From there, I actually saw it to be amusing. I soon began to snicker and I wasn't the only one who thought it was funny as I looked to a giggling Azula. Then, for the first in months, I laughed. I actually laughed. It wasn't long until we all started laughing. Prince Ozai did have a heart for he now gave me two new friends.

From there, we all became friends and grew up together. With this, I managed to experience many things lie Iroh's siege of Ba Sing Se and his success in breaking through the outer wall. Though, in the siege, Lu Ten, Zuko's cousin, was killed. Iroh soon ended the operation 600 days later. Then, after Fire Lord Azulon passed away at the age of 95, Ozai became the new Fire Lord. Zuko became his heir, but Ozai also banished Ursa, Zuko's mother. Two years later, a war meeting was called and I managed to overhear it from the roof. I was always concerned to what happened to the other nations. One of the generals suggested sacrificing a novice soldier division to lure Earth Kingdom soldiers into a trap. I was sickened he suggested it and I wasn't alone for Zuko protested against it. From there, Ozai then called upon Agni Kai and challenged Zuko. An Agni Kai is a traditional Firebender duel used to resolve conflicts. I learned about it in school. If the fighter loses, they would lose their honor. That was what got me worried. If Zuko lost, he would lose the honor in his family.

Zuko allowed me, Hiriko, and Kioko to attend the duel along with Ty Lee. Ty Lee was a friend of Azula's from the Royal Fire Academy for Girls. She was quite the cheerful and energetic girl, surprising for she came from a noble family. We watched as Zuko got prepared and we were all shocked to see who he was facing. Instead of the general, as we thought, it was Fire Lord Ozai, who actually said Zuko had brought disgrace amongst the family. I knew Zuko wouldn't go against his father, so Zuko pleaded for forgiveness from Ozai without a single attack. I saw the tears in his eyes as he looked at his father. But Ozai didn't like it. After saying "he will learn respect and suffering will be his teacher", Ozai then defeated Zuko by burning him, permanently scarring the left side of his face. I was shocked that Ozai would show such cruelty, especially to his own flesh and blood. After that, he stripped Zuko of his birthright and exiled him like his mother, declaring he could only return after finding the Avatars from which one of them disappeared 100 years ago.

That was a hopeless errand by all accounts, but Zuko took it in hope to regain his honor and everything that he'd lost. Iroh accompanied him to help him. After he left, I then had to suffer that cruel, horrible she-beast sister of his. After six weeks, I then stopped coming to the palace and hanged around in my father's study, my only connection to him left. I always did keep getting lost in those stories. Then one day, after finishing a book, and looking for a new one, became the day my life changed. I was grabbing a book from the top shelf and it was stuck. It was a small one tightly placed with larger ones. It was like trying to pull a cabbage through a small pipe. I did managed to pull it out, along with most of the shelf. I ended up covered in books. While cleaning up, I found a scroll. It might've been on top of those books and was knocked off. When I grabbed it and looked at the casing, I saw the Air Nation symbol on it. When I looked inside it, I saw it had pictographs of airbending techniques. With my father as the Avatar, there was no doubt this was an airbending scroll.

Even though I shouldn't have done it, I practiced. I didn't just do it for fun as pretending to be the Avatar, I also did it to keep my father alive. Even though he wasn't here to do this, I thought I could use this in my line of work. What I used to do before was free slaves in the Fire Nation and helped them get back home. No one knew who I was for I was in disguise. Not as El Dragon, but as a new hero people in the Earth and Water Nation came to know as the Blue Spirit, a warrior wearing a blue mask who appears in the night and helps the innocent. I hadn't transformed in a long time. My days as the Blue Spirit started a year before Zuko left. Nobody knew, not even my own mother. After Zuko left, Azula made things a little harder. At night, I was the Blue Spirit, but Roku Tengen during the day. In just a few days, I got the technique down and was able to use it in my duty as the Blue Spirit. No one knew about the technique practice except for Ty Lee. I never told her I was the Blue Spirit, but I did tell her about the scroll.

She never told anyone else about it, so I could practice with her around. I would use it as I pretended to be the Avatar. I always did lie that bright smile she had. I did it for fun, but it was weeks later that it happened. With one last kick, I airbended Ty Lee right in the face. I was shocked and so was Ty Lee. I was also shocked of what was happening to me. I told my mother what happened and, instead of being shocked like I thought she would, she cried with tears of joy, hugged me, and told me how proud she was of me for learning airbending. When I asked her how I could, she then told me about my father's Avatar lineage and how it was not passed down from one life to the next, but from parent to child. There were no secrets in marriage. Ty Lee was there when it was told so only me, her, and my mother knew about this. From there, I began using airbending as the Blue Spirit and it actually helped me do jailbreaks easier.

Though some of the guards began to become suspicious with the Blue Spirit. Some of the people even began to think that the Blue Spirit was the Avatar. I was soon beginning to worry that the Fire Nation would find me out. After 2 months, I soon saw it too dangerous for me to stay in the Fire Nation. If Azula or Fire Lord Ozai would find out, my family and my friends would be in danger. I couldn't let them get hurt because of me. I then decided to leave. I wrote Ty Lee a message and then began packing all I needed for the journey. My plan was to go out and head for the Southern Air Temple to completely learn airbending, then go to the Earth and Water Nation to learn earthbending and waterbending. This world needed a hero and I was gonna it one. I was gonna master all four elements, stop the Fire Lord, and save the world. My mother even helped me. I did this during the night so no one could know I left. The only person who would know was Ty Lee. After leaving that message in Ty Lee's room, I then began to head toward the wall.

I almost got to it, but Hiriko and Kioko followed me. They asked me where I was going and I told them I was leaving. They asked me if I was leaving the city and I told them I was leaving the nation. When they asked why I told them it was for their own safety from that nation. When they asked why they could be in danger and I told them it would be because of me and I told them to go home. They asked if anyone was going with me and I told them I was going alone. They then asked why I was going alone and I only told them to go home. They didn't stop questioning me. After seven questions, I then airbended them away from me, showing them the reason why. But they didn't go home. Instead they told me they were coming with me. Even though I told them it was too dangerous to be around an Avatar like me, they said they would still go and help me. I wasn't going alone and they would make sure of it. Seeing they made a good point, I allowed them to come with me. They got packed up and we then snuck pass the guards and took a ferry to the Earth Nation.

We began our journey to the Southern Air Temple after getting to shore and nothing was gonna stop us. Along the way, I allowed Hiriko to look at the airbending scroll and she began practicing whenever we made camp. After a while, we then saw her actually airbend right in front of us, showing her as an Airbender. This is what got Hiriko more eager to get to the Air Temple. This was her way to reconnect with her ancestral roots. Along the journey, we ended up bumping into Tadaaki, Yosuke, and Seiichi during their bending practices. They did attack us because we were from the Fire Nation, but I managed to tell them we were on their side and get them to stop. They were quite surprised when they saw me and Hiriko airbend. I told them that Hiriko was an Airbender and I was the Avatar ad they did believe it. I tried to get them to help us, but they weren't willing to help anyone for the Fire Nation. They went their separate ways and we continued on to the Air Temple.

I was a bit disappointed they wouldn't help us. With the way the world was, we were gonna need all the help we could get. Though the call of duty came around as we saw a village being attacked by Fire Nation soldiers. I told the girls to stay back while I handled this. Though I was surprised when they came along and transformed into the two members of the Element Gang, the team I was destined to lead. Hiriko transformed into Torna, the Air elemental, and Kioko transformed into ShockBlade, the Lightning elemental. With this, I allowed them to join me and, after all these years, I decided to transform into El Dragon. When we got there, it was the three of us against a group of soldiers. It was easy at first until they began using Vengestone weapons. They also wore Vengestone armor, s we had to use our bending to knock them out. Vengestone is the only known stone that is stronger than our powers. Though we couldn't through it, it didn't mean we couldn't use our powers to force them back.

In this, we also ran into the other half of our team. Apolloid, the Earth elemental, Icedra, the Ice elemental, and Posidacus, the Water elemental. When they saw us, the six of us instantly teamed up and drove the soldiers out of the village. People rejoiced to see that the Element Gang were back. After making our leave, me and the girls came to see our teammates to be the male benders we bumped into. After revealing ourselves, I then tried to get them to join us on our journey. After seeing how we helped back there and saved those people, Tadaaki and the others agreed to help us to defeat the Fire Lord. Two years later, I went to the Spirit World, met the dragon spirit, and learned of the other Avatar's return. So now you know about me and Zuko. It's the reason I can't fight him. Zuko was the one who taught me to be assertive, he helped me through brick and brim. How can you face a friend who helped you get through life?

I hoped it wouldn't come to it, but it would someday. I don't want to harm him, but if I need to, I will fight him. I just hope we can end this war before it tears our world apart. But I still know that Zuko is still the same guy I made friends with. He has a pure hear of good, I know it. I also hope that one day, we can work together to restore peace to the world. Until then, me and my team will continue on to help me master all four elements and put an end to this war once and for all. My name is Roku Tengen and me and my team will save the world.


	3. Chapter 2: The Southern Air Temple

**Chapter 2: The Southern Air Temple**

There we were, trekking up the mountain of the Southern Air Temple. We were just of a quarter way up the mountain. Luckily the Air Nomads made a path. Tadaaki made some stairs for most of the trip up. This temple was located in the Patola Mountain Range on an island in the South Sea just north of the South Pole. As we were close to the end of the climb, Yosuke began to complain.

"How much farther is this place?" Yosuke complained. "We've been climbing this mountain for 3 days!"

"Not much farther." I told him. "We're almost there."

"I don't know how much longer I can walk." Yosuke said. "Couldn't the Airbenders built these things a little closer to the ground?"

"The Air Nomads did this to protect their homes from invaders." I told him. "Besides, after 2 years of walking miles and days on a boat across the ocean, now you're complaining?"

"Yeah, but we didn't have to climb a mountain to do that." Yosuke said.

It wasn't long until we got to a snow covered ridge that we finally made it to where we wanted to be. With a great smile, I then began running and told everybody to hurry up. After running 5 yards up that zig-zag trail, we were finally in front of it.

"Element Gang, I like to give you the Southern Air Temple!" I said as we all looked upon the great majesty of the temple.

It was like we've gone to a great citadel in the sky. Walking up there, I could see how the Air Nomads lived their lives. I've read that they were peaceful in life style and knew times to train new Airbenders and to take a break. I could see young Airbenders practicing their air-bending and some using it to have fun. It was a great and wonderful time. It makes me wish I could've been here during the temple's glory days. Now it had been abandoned and left to dust. Those laughs of joy no longer filling the courtyard. And the animals that lived here now gone to where no one would see them again. It's a real shame that these temples couldn't have been saved and stayed the Airbenders' home. As we walked up to the central temple, there was something that caught our eyes. For Tadaaki, it was a stadium consisting of tall poles with some kinds of goals with rotating doors on two sides of the stadium.

I managed to figure out what this was for and me and Hiriko decided to play with it. Tadaaki tried to join in, but he ended up hit by the ball after Hiriko used her airbending to kick it into the goal, sending him flying into the goal with the ball.

"That enough of an explanation for ya, Tadaaki?" I said as he got himself out of the snow pile he was knocked into.

"Ohh. What kind of game is this?" Tadaaki groaned as he stood up.

"I think it's 'airball'." I said as me and Hiriko got down from the poles. "An exclusive sport to Airbenders."

"I think it's ridiculous." Tadaaki said with a scowl."

"That's enough fun and games." I said as me and Hiriko began walking. "Let's get back to finding those airbending scrolls."

"Are you sure there are even any left?" Tadaaki said as he joined us and the group. "The Fire Nation struck this place. The scrolls might already be ash."

"I'm sure that the Air Nomads had a way of preserving the knowledge." I told him. "And I have no doubt we'll find it in the temple."

The temple itself boasted blue and elaborately decorated spires that adorned the others. On our way inside the temple, we found a statue of an airbender in front of the door. It was an elderly man with a mustache and a round necklace sitting in a lotus stance with his fist bumped into each other in front of him. Laying against it, Hiriko found a staff that was covered in snow. When she stamped the bottom to the ground, it opened four flaps on its sides: two large flaps on the top and two smaller ones on the bottom. By the way it was designed, I took it to be some kind of glider that Airbenders used to fly. Hiriko managed to close it and I allowed her to keep it, due to her being an Airbender. That was one of the only things that connected her with her ancestors. It was a big deal to her, considering she might've been the only Air-bender left. Finding out that her own ancestors were actually what the Fire Nation killed struck her hard.

Found some old tent and, once we got inside, found some Fire Nation soldier skeletons on the floor. Looking even further, we found some Air Nomad skeletons. I even managed to find one wearing the same kind of necklace as the statue. Looking around, we found some scrolls, but they were burnt along with the knowledge. Looking around the halls, we came to a strange door. It was large and had an Air Nation symbol made of tubes.

"Okay. Does anybody know how to open this door?" Yosuke asked.

I looked to see that two swirls had pipes covering them and all 3 of them were all back-wards. That's when I figured out how to open the door. I then asked Hiriko to help me and we both sent air currents into the tubes with our airbending. When the currents started flowing through, the two swirls flipped around, changing from blue to purple and blowing like horns. The pipes on them turned sideways and created a new pipe to the third swirl and it soon did the same as the other two. The door then started to slowly open and we stopped. We then went into the room and found a lot of statues of people lined up in a circular pattern. When I got a closer look, I saw who they were.

"What's up with all the statues?" Tadaaki asked as we looked around.

"These are statues of the past Avatars." I said, amazed to be seeing these great statues. "I recognize them from my father's stories." I then looked to a statue of a Waterbender and ran over. "Look at that! It's Avatar Kuruk! He chased down Koh, the Face Stealer, for stealing the face of his wife." I then looked to a statue of an Earthbender and ran over to it. "And here's Avatar Kyoshi!"

"And this one's an Airbender!" Hiriko said as she stood in front of a statue of an Air-bender.

"That's Avatar Yangchen!" I said as I saw who she was looking at. "She battled the spirit General Old Iron." I then looked to how they were sorted. "They're all sorted by the Avatar Cycle: air, water, earth…" I then went over and stood in front of one great Avatar. "Fire. Avatar Roku, the previous Avatar, the one I'm named after. He saved people of an entire island from two erupting volcanoes."

"That's great and all for the history, but where are the scrolls?" Yosuke asked.

I then snapped out of my star daze and continued our search. That's when I found another door and we all went through it to find a secret underground room. It looked like the perfect place to store scrolls with all the shelves around, but we found them completely empty. The others went to check the further one, but came back with the same result. I fell in depression for there wasn't any more of the Air Nomads, it was gone along with them. But then I looked to the bottom shelf and saw a small book. I then grabbed and read what was inside. All the words were hand written.

"What is that?" Tadaaki asked as he and the others came over to me after I stood up and kept reading.

"Looks like some kind of journal." I answered.

I then looked to the beginning page and saw some writing saying "Property of Choku." I spoke out loud and my eyes widen at the name.

"Choku? Who's Choku?" Yosuke asked, confused by that.

"Choku is my ancestor…from a hundred years ago." I said.

"Hold on." Seiichi said. "You mean this is the Fire Dragon that worked with Roku?"

"No, that was Oogway." I said, correcting him. "This is his grandson."

"What exactly is so important about your grandpa?" Yosuke asked.

"Choku was supposed to work with Roku's successor." I answered. "He might've knew what happened to the new Avatar and wrote it in his journal."

"Well, what are you waiting for?" Tadaaki said, ushering me to read. "Get to reading!"

"Okay." I said as I began searching through the pages.

As I read, I found out that Choku was born in Omashu, one of the greatest cities in the Earth Nation. I managed to find the right page and started reading.

 _With the new Avatar revealed, I then began my journey to the Southern Air Temple to learn airbending and to meet with my old friend Aang before he is sent to the Eastern Air Temple to continue his Avatar training._

Looked like Choku had the same idea I had. I even told the others that and I then kept reading.

 _Upon my arrival, I was greeted kindly by the great Air Nomads, including with Monk Gyatso, Aang's guardian and teacher. They were honored to have me at their grace, but they soon gave me looks of depression as I asked of where Aang was. They told me he had ran away and I looked to see it was true. I tried to go out and look for him, but the monks said they couldn't afford to lose me too. I then told them I would go and find Aang after my airbending training. It was taking longer than I expect and a lot tougher. Though my training came to an end sooner than expected for the Fire Nation began their attack. We managed to fortify ourselves in the temple where I came up with a plan to use my earthbending to dig underground and escape into the Earth Nation. We gathered up in the great hall and gathered up all the scrolls we could get. And, to make sure some of the Airbenders got out, the monks and a couple of Airbenders would hold the Fire Nation soldiers off._

 _Monk Gyatso was one of them. He told me to promise him, no matter what happened, to find Aang and help master all the elements and stop the Fire Lord. I did so and that was the last I ever spoke to him before he sealed the door. I then used my earthbending to create a tunnel down through the mountain and over to the Earth Nation. From there, I completed my airbending training with the one scroll I had and the Airbenders scattered amongst the Earth Nation, going into hiding and never showing their bending. I then began my search for Aang. I searched everywhere. Throughout out the entire Earth Nation and from the North Pole to the South Pole. Still I couldn't find him. It was like he vanished from the face of the earth. After 4 years, I then stopped my search and began to wait for him, hoping he would return. I tried to face the Fire Nation on my own, but they were too strong. And with the Air Nation gone, all my descendants are forced to be born in the Fire Nation._

 _If anyone finds this, please find my descendant and help him find Aang or his successor and help them master all four elements. For any Airbender who will aid them in their quest, I give you my staff so you will fly like your ancestors once did in the past. My dear descendant, I hope the airbending scroll is of great help even with its limited knowledge. Use the elements of all four nations to end this war and save our world from destruction. My duty is now yours and I wish you the best of luck to both you and either Aang or his successor. I know you will be able to bring balance back to the world. I believe in you. Just as much as Gyatso._

As I closed the journal, we all looked at each other with shock and depression.

"Gyatso…" I said as I starred at the journal with amazement. "He helped Choku and the other Airbenders escapes. He sacrificed himself to save them. He's a hero."

"Hold on." Tadaaki said with confusion. "If the Airbenders have been hiding in the Earth Nation this entire time, how come we haven't seen any of them?"

"Probably because that this bending hadn't been taught in over a century, none of the descendants remember how. The only way to reveal their power is if they remember the technique like Hiriko." I said. "Keeping that knowledge hidden was the only way to keep their families safe."

"So I'm not the last Airbender." Hiriko said with some joy.

"Yep." I said. "But neither I or you will become masters until we find an airbending master."

"What are you talking about?" Yosuke said. "Choku said there aren't any more airbending masters."

"That's where you're wrong, my friend." I said. "As Choku had said, Aang had escaped and his body was never found."

"Yeah, so?" Yosuke asked.

"So, I think he might still be alive." I answered. "He must be the Avatar the dragon spirit spoke about."

"How do you know that?" Tadaaki asked.

"Because, if he weren't, then he would've been reincarnated into the Water Nation." I said.

"That's why they took all the Waterbenders in the South Pole!" Seiichi said out of realization.

"Exactly. And all of them proved to not be the next Avatar." I said. "They did the same to the Airbenders, only to come to the same result."

"So you're saying that the Avatar after Roku is still alive after a century?!" Tadaaki asked, just as confused as everyone else.

"Exactly." I answered.

"Then he must be really, really old." Kioko said, surprised by this.

"About 112 to be exact." I said. "Or as said in Choku's journal."

"Whoa! That's really old!" Tadaaki said.

"Let's just hope he still haves some fight in him after all these years." I said. "Though I think it's time to put the brave souls of the Airbenders to rest."

With that, we then carried all the bodies of the Airbenders down the mountain and buried them right at the base of the mountain, all with tombstones engraved with the Air Nation symbol. We left the Fire Nation soldiers to rot for their sins. I found a drawing of Gyatso in Choku's journal and engraved his stone with the nation symbol and these words: "Monk Gyatso: a true master, hero, and friend." With it, I placed my hand upon it and solemnly said "Rest in peace, my friend." With this, we then gave our condolences and left to continue on our journey. We are now on our way to the North Pole so I could learn waterbending, then go to the Earth Nation where I'll learn earthbending. After that, we will then go to seek out the last airbending master in the world so I'll fully master airbending. We would go and find…Avatar Aang.


	4. Chapter 3: Winter Solstice, Part 1

**Chapter 3: Winter Solstice, Part 1: The Spirit World**

Along the way, we came across a large, dark patch of burned land standing out amongst the lash green of the forest we were in. No doubt the Fire Nation soldiers went through here. This just made me sick. Those soldiers had no respect for nature. I wasn't the only one who thought of it. We managed to make it to a village that was going under reconstruction. When everyone looked and saw me, Kioko, and Hiriko, they instantly went into hiding. When we tried to speak to them, we were confronted by the village leader.

"Who are you?" he asked as he faced me. "Why have you Firebenders come into our village?"

"My name is Roku Tengen, son of Natsuo Tengen, descendant of Choku." I said. I then revealed my tail as the villagers came out of hiding. "And I'm the Avatar."

Everyone seemed to believe me as they were all surprised. I knew anyone would know a Fire Dragon by looking at the tail.

"My humble graces, young Avatar." The leader said as he bowed to me. "It is an honor to meet you. What brings you to our village?"

"Me and my friends are on our way to the North Pole." I said. "We're also looking for someone. Do you happen to know an Airbender named Aang?"

"Oh, yes. He pasted here yesterday." The leader said.

"Yesterday?" I said. "So we just missed him?"

"Yes. He also saved our village." An old man said.

"He did?" I asked.

"Yes. Come by my place and I'll tell you." The old man said.

We managed to get there and listened. He told us that for a few days, the village had been attacked by a monster at sunset. It was Hei Bai, the Black and White spirit. I had heard of him. He is said to be the guardian of the Earth Nation forest. I would have to say that the destruction of the forest enraged him. Though people aren't able to see spirits, the winter solstice, which was today, weakens the barrier between the mortal world and the Spirit World, allowing the villagers to see Hei Bai. For 3 nights, Hei Bai had also kidnapped villagers with each attack. But last night, Aang appeared and managed to reason with the spirit. Hei Bai had then calmed down and then allowed everyone he took to return.

"The Avatar saved our home." The old man said as he finished his story.

"Do you know where he was going?" I asked him.

"Yes. Said something about a crescent island." The old man said.

I was shocked to hear that.

"Crescent Island?!" I said. "That's the most secure place in the Fire Nation. There are soldiers all over the place. Why would he go there?"

"To be honest, I really don't know." The old man said. "He was rushed out of here in an instant."

I then looked to the window and saw that the sun was beginning to set, nearing the start of the first night of the winter solstice.

"It's getting late. We'll sleep here and continue on in the morning." I said. "With any luck, we'll meet Aang in the North Pole."

After the sun set and the moon began its rise, we all then went to bed. We couldn't continue through the night. I was deep asleep and was only awaken when I heard something walking around. I followed it outside and to the edge of the village, right at the entrance of the forest. I looked around, trying to see what made that sound. I even called out to see if it was someone. I then heard something walking through the forest and heading towards me. I turned to face it and waited for it to step out of the shadows. The moon was a quarter way to its peak and I waited as the sound got closer. I then watched as an animal crawled out from the forest. I thought it was a bear of some sort. I heard that the Earth King, which is a reason why just about everyone call the Earth Nation the "Earth Kingdom", haves one as a personal pet. It wasn't like any creature I saw. It was like a platypus bear, but it had a muzzle instead of a bill and a stubby tail instead of a flat tail.

I never thought I'd get to see a big one or any bear for that matter. Judging by its black and white fur, I knew this had to be Hei Bai. I stood still as I didn't know what he would do and was greeted by a gently nuzzle. I then watched as he laid down, showing me to get on. I did so and I rode him as he went into the forest. It was a smooth ride and it ended with him taking me to a bear-like statue. I got off him and asked him why he brought me here. He then looked up to the sky and I did the same to see the moon reaching its peak. I then watched as a large circle formed in front of the statue, giving off a blue glow. I then watched as it formed the yin-yang and then gave a large flash so bright I had to cover my eyes. After it dimmed away, I looked to see an old man glowing in a blue hue and wielding a blue staff with the yin-yang symbol on the top, some of the yin and the dot of the yang missing. The man was a bald man and, by the way he was dressed, from the Southern Water Tribe.

"Hello, Roku." The man said. "I have been waiting for you."

"Who are you?" I asked.

"My name is Oogway, the Avatar who worked alongside Avatar Roku," the man said, "and grandfather to Choku."

"Oogway?" I said, shocked to meet my own ancestor from a century ago. "It is an honor to meet you."

"As much as a pleasure to meet you, grandson." Oogway said with a gentle smile.

"But how are you here?" I asked.

"The winter solstice." He answered. "With the light of the first winter moon, the barrier between the mortal realm and the Spirit World is lifted, allowing spirits to become seen, even my own."

"So Hei Bai brought me here to meet you?"

"Yes. For I had told him to bring you here."

"But why?"

"Because I have a message for you. One of great importance, one that I could only tell you on this very night."

"What is it, grandfather?"

"The one event that will lead to the end of this world."

I was shocked to hear this. The end of the world? What could cause this? Would this have to do with the Fire Lord or something worse than that?


	5. Chapter 4: Winter Solstice, Part 2

**Chapter 4: Winter Solstice Part 2: Avatar Oogway**

There I was, standing in the forest with Oogway, the Avatar of Roku's time, right in front of me with Hei Bai in front of the statue. I was still shocked for what Oogway had told me, leading me to ask him one question.

"What?!" I said in shock. "Grandfather, how can that be? What event would be so disastrous to end the entire world?"

"If you wish to know of what must never happen, then I shall tell you." Oogway said as I then took a seat with my legs crossed for respect. "One hundred years ago, Fire Lord Sozin used a comet to begin the war. He and his firebending army harnessed its incredible power and dealt a deadly first strike against the other nations."

"I know that comet." I said, surprised that he knew what it was that started this war. "That's Sozin's Comet, named after Sozin when he figured out how to harness its power."

"I see that you kept up with your history." Oogway said with a smile.

"It comes to living in the Fire Nation." I said. "But that happened a century ago. What does this have to do with the world now?"

"Listen carefully. Sozin's Comet will return by the end of the summer and Fire Lord Ozai will use its power to finish the war once and for all. And he is not the only one who seeks to do so. With the battle that will decide yours along with the world's fate, its power will be harnessed by our most ancient foe."

"Dargon." I said with realization of who else he was talking about.

"Yes." He said with the same grim look as before. "If they succeed, even you nor Aang won't be able to restore balance to the world. Roku, you must find Aang and defeat the Fire Lord before the comet arrives."

"But I don't even know where he is." I said with fear. "I haven't even mastered airbending or started learning waterbending! Not to mention earthbending!"

"Mastering the elements takes years of discipline and practice." Oogway said. "But if the world is to survive, you must do it by summer's end."

"What if I can't find Aang or master all the elements in time? What if I fail?" I turned to look at the ground in depression.

"I know you can do it, Roku." Oogway said as he put a hand on my shoulder. I looked to see his smile. "I believe in you and I am not the only one who thinks so."

I then thought about it and saw he was right. There were people who believed in me to save the world just as much as they believed in Aang. People who are willing to save their home, my friends, and my family. They all have the strength to keep on going and they also had hope for a bright future. They believe in the Avatars, in me and Aang. With that, my courage came back and I returned Oogway's smile. We then looked to the moon and saw it was getting close to setting. This meant one thing.

"The solstice is ending." Oogway aid as we both stood up and he stood in front of the statue with Hei Bai. "We must go our separate ways for now."

"But what if I have questions?" I asked. "How will I talk to you?"

"My spirit will always be with you." Oogway said. "When you need to talk to me again, you will find a way."

With that, I watched as Oogway closed his eyes and the moon began to set. As it did, I watched as both him and Hei Bai began to disappear. When the moon was gone, they instantly vanished. With this, I returned to the village to regain some sleep. When morning came, I was instantly refreshed like I didn't lose any sleep at all. Guess I had Oogway for that. After I told the others what happened last night, they were pretty shocked of what Oogway told me.

"The end of the summer?!" Yosuke said in shock. "That only gives us a few months! We'll never be able to do it before that comet!"

"Do you even have a plan to get this done before it arrives?" Tadaaki asked.

"Look, I know this seems impossible and I'm asking a lot out of you, but if we stand together and never give up, we can be able to do this." I said with hope. "I mean it. How long have our ancestors been protecting this world and keeping balance?"

"800,000 years." Seiichi said with depression.

"Exactly." I said. "And not once did they give up. You might not know it, but you all have great untapped power. Not just you're bending, but also within yourselves. Throughout this whole journey, each of you had showed great strength and will against all odds. Hiriko, Kioko, even though I told you to stay behind, you still had the courage to leave the Fire Nation and help me, despite the risks there were. And you three, you left your homes to defend them and managed to save others along with them. And we all did this because we have hope. Hope to end this war. Hope where we can live in a future where no one lives in fear and live together in harmony. I know this because, as much as you believe in me, I believe in you. Every last one of you. I believe we can be able to defeat the Fire Lord and bring peace back to the world! Now, what do you say? Are you with me?"

With that, they all yelled out their agreement to keep going, their will now returned. With this, we then packed up, said our goodbyes as the village gave their hope for us, and then continued up north. Now all of us were gonna keep going, find Aang, and save this world. No matter what, we will never give up. We will protect this world from any threat placed on it. We will protect…our home.


	6. Chapter 5: The Waterbending Scroll

**Chapter 5: The Waterbending Scroll**

Along our journey to the North Pole, we managed to bump into new allies. The first of them was on an island, a small one in the Earth Nation. Seiichi took us there for he thought we could use the elephant koi to take us to the North Pole. It wasn't really a good idea due to that we couldn't get control and we would've been eaten by the unagi, a giant creature native to the Earth Nation's southwestern waters. After getting back to shore after running into that unagi, we were ambushed by a group of warriors who kidnapped us and tied us to a pole. When we saw our attackers, we were shocked to see they were all women. It was quite surprising not seeing a warrior group without both men and women. They questioned us for why we were here and I told them we were looking for a way to the North Pole and didn't mean any harm. They didn't believe us for me, Hiriko, and Kioko were wearing Fire Nation clothing, making the island leader, Oyaji suspicious of us.

He actually thought we were spies sent by the Fire Nation. After stating the island as Kyoshi Island, which had stayed out of the war and intending to keep it that way, I was soon struck with remembrance of that name. I then looked to the women and saw that they were all dressed like Avatar Kyoshi. From there, I told them the island was named after Kyoshi and I knew her. The leader of the warriors, Suki, stated that it was impossible with Oyaji saying Kyoshi died over 400 years ago. I then explained that one of my ancestors worked with Kyoshi as the other Avatar and I was the descendant and the newest Avatar. Everyone in the village thought I was lying and were determined to feed us to the gray beast in the water. As proof, I then airbended my way out of the rope and revealed my tail. From there, the villagers believed me, released us, and welcomed us into their village. And, to make sure the Fire Nation didn't know, I made sure that the word didn't go out to Zuko. The villagers gave a feast in my honor and we all joined in.

After that, we then got a look at Kyoshi's statue and I bowed in respect. After that, we then decided to do a little test. Because the island was a part of the Earth Nation, we then tried to see if there were any Airbenders here. Suki thought it was impossible for the Airbenders were extinct, but I told her some of them were saved and were hiding in the Earth Nation. As proof, I had Hiriko show her some of her airbending. Because of what she showed, some of the Kyoshi girls wanted to learn it from her. Though Yosuke and Seiichi doubted it, they were proven wrong when those girls airbended them across the ground. Though I was flattered, I found it annoying with those Kyoshi girls following me around. Hiriko managed to get some practice with the Kyoshi Warriors and learned their fighting style. Along with our stay, we heard on how Aang managed to save the village from the Fire Nation.

When the village was beginning to burn, Aang got control of the unagi and used it to put out the fire with water spouts. After he left, the soldiers went after him. I asked them where he was going and they said they didn't know. After a while, we then decided to continue on. We told them we would go to Omashu to see if anyone had seen him and try to find a way to the North Pole. We told the Airbenders to keep those powers hidden to avoid the Fire Nation's suspicion. From this visit, Hiriko received a special gift from Suki: a Kyoshi Warrior fan to use in the fight against the Fire Nation. She said Hiriko had proven herself as a warrior and told her to use the fan to end the war. Hiriko promised her and we then sat off to Omashu. When we got there, me, Hiriko, and Kioko decided to wear disguises to get through the gate. Omashu might be friendly inside the walls, but it was definitely full of security around them.

Found proof of that when a cabbage merchant lost his cart for bringing rotten cabbages along with me nearly getting crushed by a boulder. Once we got in, we got to see the Omashu delivery system: miles of tubes and chutes that send packages throughout the city through earthbending. According to the journal, Choku, Aang, and their eccentric friend Bumi would slide down them for fun. Those were moments he missed. While reading about it, Kioko managed to slip away and went riding down a chute. We decided to follow her to make sure she didn't get hurt and that wasn't fun. Kioko nearly got killed by a package of spears, we got derailed from the chute, wrecked a few roofs, and crashed the bins into that merchant's cart. We didn't know how he got in or how he got the cart, but his disappointment was the least of our worries. The crash caused the disguises to become damaged and revealed our Fire Nation clothes.

With that, we were instantly arrested by the guards. We were brought to the King of Omashu, who said that we were to be punished for "vandalism, traveling under false pretenses, and malicious destruction of cabbages." The king actually got some curiosity with me and actually placed me through three deadly challenges. To make sure I did so, he took Kioko and Hiriko and put rings made of jennamite on them. I read about it. It is a mineral that grows remarkably fast. If it is placed on a person, it'll start growing around them. If not removed, the crystals will grow until they cover the entire body and they suffocate. The king told me he'd remove them if I completed the challenges. For my friends' safety, I did as he asked. It was only for me, so the guys could only watch me do it. For the first challenge, I had to retrieve a key that was dangling inside a waterfall. I was gonna be using my head for these challenges so I could get that jennamite off the girls fast.

It was too strong for me to dive in or climb from underneath. Even with airbending, I still wouldn't be able to get up there. I then decided to reveal my tail and use my powers to break a stalagmite and use it, along with my airbending, to shoot through the waterfall and get the key to the king. After that, the crystals were now covering the girls' arms. For the second challenge, I had to return the king's lost pet Flopsie. I searched high and low and managed to find a rabbit. I thought it was Flopsie and tried to grab it, but a goat gorilla appeared and scared the rabbit. I tried to get it while the beast chased me. Unfortunately, the rabbit escaped and the beast was about to attack me. But, when I looked at the creature's ears, I soon realized that the beast was Flopsie. To prove it, I said its name and it gave me a licking and it returned to the king, who I saw rub its stomach. After that, Hiriko and Kioko were covered from head to ankle in crystal.

For the final challenge, I had to win a fight. He allowed me to choose the opponent from two warriors and to choose carefully. I then realized I could choose the king and did so. If he wanted a fight, then I was gonna fight the one who forced me to it. The king said I made the wrong choice and Tadaaki doubted it, due to his old man physique. But he was proven wrong when the king removed his robe, revealing the muscle toned body he had hidden. I was set back a bit, but I wasn't gonna let my friends die. The king claimed he was the most powerful Earthbender I would ever meet. As our battle began, I found it a little difficult with his earth-bending. But I managed to counter his attacks with both my firebending and airbending. I manage to beat him, but, before he freed my friends, he told me I had one more challenge: tell him his name. That had to be the most difficult challenge yet and we had to hurry. Hiriko and Kioko were almost covered.

We tried guessing, but none of them seemed right. Then I thought about the challenges. Each one had forced me to think differently than I usually would. That's when I realized that they had the same craziness as one person. I soon realized what his name was. I went up to him and told him I figured out who he was. There was only one person who could think this crazy, the one who would use it for fun: Bumi. I got it right and Bumi removed the crystals. He also revealed it to be edible. Like I said, crazy. We were all surprised to see he was Choku's best friend. We asked him why he made me do all those challenges instead of telling us who he really was. He said he had fun messing with people. Also, because I was the Avatar, I had the difficult task to restore balance to the world by defeating the Fire Lord. With how much the world had changed, I still had a lot to learn. Bumi hoped that when I had, I will think as he said "like a mad genius."

With that, I thanked him for all he had done and, because I needed one, I asked of him to be my earthbending teacher. He said he would be honored. I'd told him after I found Aang and mastered air and waterbending, I would return to learn earthbending and he said he would be waiting. With that, we then left to continue on. To top all the surprises, we actually made it to Tadaaki's home village. He told us it was once enslaved by the Fire Nation, but we came to see it free and filled with happy families. Along with them, we met up with Haru, Tadaaki's Earthbender friend, who told us what happened to the village. Aang had showed up and saved the village, but he didn't do it alone. Along with him, a girl from the Southern Water Tribe named Katara managed to sneak into the prison rig the other Earthbenders were being enslaved at and inspired those Earthbenders to stand up for themselves.

Tadaaki was amazed that those two were able to get all the Earthbenders in the village to fight back the Fire Nation. Tadaaki then revealed me as the other Avatar and the others, including him and me, as the Element Gang. After hearing where they were heading, we decided to do the same. Turned out we were all heading to the North Pole, of we were bound to meet up with them. Seeing those places showed me how Aang had changed the world. With actions like these, he must've been wise amongst his ears and had a true heart of gold. Though it was getting harder to get to the North Pole. We still didn't have faster transportation and we were still far away. This was the problem: the North Pole was miles across water. We couldn't fly over there because there might've been Fire Nation ships scouting over there. We needed another way over there. After walking for a while, we decided to make camp and eat. As we ate, we tried to figure out how to get across the ocean.

I listened to some of their ideas, but I then heard something upriver. It told everyone to quiet down while I listened.

"Roku, what is it?" Seiichi asked.

"It sounds like… people." I said as I heard someone talking. "It's coming from over there. Come on."

We then got up and went off to find out who or what it was. After walking a yard, we found another camp. We hid in the bushes to make sure we weren't seen. I couldn't see them, but I counted a trio. We couldn't see their faces, but we could see the clothes of two of them. They looked like they were from the Water Tribe.

"Yosuke, Seiichi, are those two from the North Pole?" I asked quietly. "They look like they're from the Water Tribe."

"No. They're not." Yosuke answered. "Those two are from the South Pole."

"What are Southerners doing here?" Seiichi asked.

"I don't know, but I'll find out." I said as I saw some of their bags were set aside. "Wait here."

I then snuck over and grabbed the satchel. I looked around in it to figure out why they were here or where they were going. It definitely belong to a girl as I found some hair pins along with some robes. I put those back and managed to find something that caught my eye: a scroll with the Water Tribe symbol on it. I opened it up to see it was a waterbending scroll. I didn't know why they had it, but this was a great stroke of luck. This could've helped me learn some waterbending before me and the gang got to the North Pole. With that, I decided to take it and put the bag back, getting me and the gang back to our camp. After we did, I then brought the scroll out.

"Roku, what's that?" Tadaaki asked as he saw the scroll in my hand.

"You won't believe it." I answered as he and the others gave me a questioning look.

I then put the scroll on a log and laid it out along it. Yosuke and Seiichi gasped as they saw the pictographs.

"A waterbending scroll?" Seiichi said, amazed to see it.

"Yep." I said, smugly.

"Where did you get that?" Yosuke asked, wondering where I found it.

"I found it in one of the bags of that trio." I answered.

"You stole it?" Yosuke asked, shocked.

"Relax." I told him. "I'll give it back after I mastered these moves."

"Are you sure you'll be able to do them?" Seiichi asked, questioningly.

"Seiichi." I said, annoyed by his question.

"I'm just saying." Seiichi said. "You're a Firebender and these are techniques for a Waterbender."

"You're forgetting. I'm the Avatar." I told him and he raised an eyebrow at me. "Just watch. Once I master this, earthbending will be a stitch."

"Fine. Then get to it." Seiichi said.

I looked to Yosuke to find him gone. I looked over to the river to see him swimming in it.

"Oh, go ahead." He said as I looked at him. "I won't mind. It'll be quite a show seeing you fail."

As he laughed, I glared at him and got started reading the scroll. I'd show him. I just need one move mastered. I started with the one on the bottom. Seemed simple enough. Just make a wave. I then went over to the shore and started moving my hands back and forth, trying to make some small waves to start with. At first, nothing seemed to happen. But, a minute later, the water started moving. It wasn't long until I was making waves. I smiled to see I was actually doing it, I was waterbending. Even the others were amazed to see it. It was easy. But, after I stopped, Yosuke started laughing.

"What's so funny?" I asked as I looked at him.

"That bending." He answered. "That's the most simple bending yet. My mom was able to do it when she was young and she was only 4." He then continued laughing.

I was annoyed by that and went to the scroll and saw I could make a bigger wave and saw my chance to show him.

"Hey, how about I make a wave crash on you?" I told him as I went to the shore. "You won't be laughing anymore from that!"

"How about you just shut your yap and do it?" he said as he stopped laughing and put on a smug.

"Okay, I will." I said.

I then calmed down and tried to raise the water, but it only moved 3 inches before I dropped it. After that failed attempt, I then tried to put some force into it. Raising the water was like lifting an entire Fire navy ship. It was so hard that I actually had to close my eyes to get my arms all the way up.

"Am I making a huge wave?" I asked, strained to keep it up.

"Well…it's a start of it." Seiichi said, uncertainly.

I managed to open my right eye to see that the wave I made was just a small spout. With that, I gave up and tried to catch my breath. After I did, I glared at Yosuke as he started laughing again.

"Stop laughing!" I said, angrily.

"Seriously? You can't even make a big wave. That was pathetic!" Yosuke said as he continued to laugh.

I growled at him and would've airbended him if Hiriko hadn't stopped me.

"Roku, let it go." Hiriko said. "You still have a few more techniques. I'm sure you'll get the next one."

I then calmed down and said "You're right. I still need to practice."

I then went over to the scroll and looked to the third one. Looked like a water whip. Thought it would be easier. I then went to the shore and managed to pull some water out of the river. It was a little hard keeping it up, but I managed to get it over to me. My whip was a bit small, but it would be enough for practice. I tried to move it forward, but it just the opposite and nearly hit Seiichi in the face. Luckily, he ducked and it only hit a tree he was in front of.

"Hey, watch it!" Seiichi angrily said as he got up and glared at me.

"Whoops! Let me just…" I said as I tried again.

I tried to whip the tree, but I ended up whipping Yosuke by mistake.

"Hey, leave me out of this!" Yosuke yelled as he popped out of the water.

"Sorry!" I said to him.

I tried again, trying to go forward to the river, but the whip went back and whipped me in the face. From there, I just snapped.

"Duck and cover!" Seiichi said as he and the others went into hiding.

They had a good idea for I just unleashed the tigerdillo. With this, I firebend from both my fist and my mouth. Zuko taught me that. After my outburst I then slouched and crumbled in frustration.

"Ugh! This is hopeless!" I groaned. "I'll never get this waterbending down!"

I didn't know it, but everyone stood up from their hiding spots and looked at me with worry. The one other thing I didn't notice was that someone else was watching.

"Excuse me." A gentle voice said. I looked to my right to see a girl standing there. "Are you okay?"

"Aah!" I yelled as I fell to the ground. I looked at the girl and saw she had brown skin, blue eyes, and dark brown hair. Two clumps of that hair were in the front were attached to hair clips, forming two loops, and the back was pulled back into a braid. I tried to catch my breath from that scare she gave me. "Jeez! You nearly gave me a heart attack!"

"Oh, sorry." She said, apologetically. "I just overheard you and just wanted to get my scroll back. I didn't know I'd find this."

I then looked at what she was wearing and saw she was from the Southern Water Tribe. This meant this was the one I took the scroll from. I then got the scroll off that stump and was now ashamed.

"I'm sorry for taking your scroll. I just needed to borrow it." I said as I gave it to her. "So you saw everything, huh?"

"Yes. What were you doing?" she said.

"Trying to learn how to waterbend." I told her with a depressed look.

"Waterbend?" she said with confusion. "But…you're a Firebender."

"Yes. I'm also the Avatar." I said and I motioned to my tail. "Can't you tell by the tail?"

She then looked at my tail and then looked at me with shock.

"You're El Dragon?" she asked.

"Yep. And before me, it was my father." I answered. "And his father before him and so on and so on."

"Wait. I thought the Avatar was reincarnated into the next nation in the cycle." She said.

"The normal one does." I said. "You see, the lineage I'm part of are called Fire Dragons, the very Fire elementals and leader of the Element Gang. Instead of the powers of both the elemental and the Avatar being passed down from one life to the next, they're passed down in the bloodline, from parent to child."

"Oh. So you come from a whole family of Avatars."

"Yes. The Avatars in the cycle you know, like Kuruk, Kyoshi, Yangchen, and Roku, when they are reincarnated, it is tradition that the 3rd generation of the Fire Dragon that worked with the previous Avatar is born into the nation opposite to the one the new Avatar's born into."

"Why do you do that?"

"It is so that they could help each other. Being of opposite elements, they could learn from each other and master said elements faster than usual. The last one to do so was Choku."

"How long ago was that?"

"A hundred years ago. With the nation I was born in, you can tell which one he was from."

She gave it some thought and soon realized what I meant.

"He was an Earthbender?"

"Yep."

"So he was meant to work with Aang."

"Yeah. How did you know that?"

"Because I know him."

"You've met him?"

"I've been traveling with him."

That's when it hit me. The girl I was talking to was Katara.

"So you're Katara." I said. "The girl who inspired the enslaved Earthbenders to stand up for themselves."

"Yes. How do you know who I am?"

"Because those benders are from my village." Tadaaki said as we watched him and the others come out of the bushes. I even looked to Yosuke getting out of the river and getting dressed to join us.

"Katara, I'd like you to meet Seiichi Himi, Yosuke Agawa, Kioko Araya, my cousin Hiriko Arashi, and Tadaaki Akashi." I said, introducing my team.

"It is an honor to meet you." Tadaaki said, bowing to her. "I can't thank you enough for saving my village."

"You're welcome." Katara said. She then looked to me. "So you're trying to learn water-bending?"

"Yes." I said. "Speaking of which, I have to ask. Why did you have that waterbending scroll?"

"To learn from it." she said.

We then watched as she then did the same move I tried, but instead of that small wave that I made, she actually made a large one. We were all shocked to see that, along with her crashing the wave back into the river.

"You're a Waterbender?" I asked, still shocked.

"Mm-hmm." She nodded with a smile.

"But…I thought there weren't any more Waterbenders in the South Pole."

"Not exactly." She said. "I'm the only Waterbender left. My mother managed to save me."

"So you need the scroll to master waterbending."

"Yes. Though I'm learning how." Katara said, bashfully.

"By the way you just made that wave, I'd say you're on your way." Seiichi said, impressed.

"Yeah. Seiichi and Yosuke are Waterbenders from the North Pole." I told her, breaking out of my shock.

"You're from the North Pole?" Katara asked in shock.

"Yeah." Yosuke said, calmly. "Actually all six of us are benders."

"Yeah, but before we get ahead, would you mind taking us to Aang?" I asked.

"Yes, of course." Katara answered. "Come on. I'll take you back to our camp."

With that, we got all our stuff and followed her. We finally did it. We found Aang. I was filled with excitement that we were finally gonna meet him. When we got there, Hiriko was met by a little creature with big ears and eyes, bat-like wings on its arms, and a ringed tail that flew onto her shoulder and nuzzled her.

"What is that?" Tadaaki asked.

"I think that's a flying lemur." I answered, remembering what I studied. "A native creature of the Air Nation. Might be the last of its kind."

I then gave the lemur a scratch behind the ears. A few moments later, we watched as the lemur flew off and went past Katara as she walked over to us. With her was a guy wearing similar clothing. The robe was sleeveless and he wore a blue sleeved shirt underneath and white wraps on his forearms. His hair was the same color as Katara's and it was shaved except for the middle on the top of his head, forming a wide stripe. With that kind of clothing, there was no doubt he was from the South Pole.

"Guys, these are Roku, his cousin Hiriko, Kioko, Seiichi, Tadaaki, and Yosuke." Katara said, doing introduction. "Guys, this is my brother Sokka."

"So you're the Sokka Suki told me about." I said to him.

"You know Suki?" Sokka said with surprise.

"Yep. And she gave a special gift to Hiriko." I said.

Then Hiriko brought out her fan and both Sokka and Katara were surprised by it.

"So where's Aang?" I asked after Hiriko put her fan away.

"Oh, right." Katara said as she remembered. "Everyone, I'd like you to meet Aang."

She moved aside to reveal the one person we were waiting for, but we were shocked to see what he looked like. He did have the airbending tattoos on his head and hands and the clothes of an Airbender, but he didn't really look the age we thought he would be. He was light skinned, had grey eyes, and somewhat larger than normal ears. Though he didn't even look that old. He actually looked…younger. About 3 years younger than me by the look of it.

"You're Avatar Aang?" I asked in disbelief.

"Yep." Aang said cheerfully.

"But…you're so…" I said.

"Small." Tadaaki finished me.

"Yeah. It's been a hundred years." Hiriko said. "How can you be so young?"

"It's a bit of a long story." Aang said.

We then gathered up and me and the gang listened as Katara explained how she and Sokka found him. After that, we understood how it happened.

"So you're telling me you found him in an iceberg?" I asked.

"Yes, that's right." Katara said.

"That explains how he's so young after a century." I said. "And how neither Choku or the Fire Nation was able to find him. He must've went into the Avatar State and airbended the water around him, turning it into ice."

"Heh. Talk about hiding in plain sight." Tadaaki said with a snicker.

"So what's with you guys?" Sokka asked us. "Why are you going against the Fire Nation?"

With that, I then explained our story from the beginning to now. There was some tear shed from Katara for she had the same pain from when she lost her mother and her father left. There was also some surprise from Aang when we told him there were still some Airbenders left in the world, a threat from Sokka with his boomerang when I mentioned I was friends with Zuko, some laughs, and amazement that we came all this way to save the world we live in.

"And that's our story." I said, wrapping it up.

"I can't believe there are other Airbenders!" Aang said in amazement.

"Yep. And after the war is over, we hope to find all the other Airbenders out there and rebuild the Air Nation." I said.

That got Aang to give a big smile.

"Hold on." Sokka said, dragging our attention to him. "So the only one who know you're the other Avatar is a girl in the Fire Nation? How do you know she won't rat you out?"

"Ty Lee? Of course she won't. She's one of my oldest friends." I said to him. "Besides, if she did tell anyone else, we would be chased down by Fire Nation soldiers by now."

"He's got a point." Tadaaki said, supporting me. "And we've been avoiding the Fire Nation for years. Not once did they know where we were going."

"And we've came all this way to find you, Aang." I said to him. "The biggest reason is because…I need you to teach me how to airbend."

"Me?" Aang said in shock.

"Yes." I said as I held up the airbending scroll. "The knowledge in this scroll is limited. To fully master airbending, I need an airbending master and you're the only one left."

"I also need it to learn some more airbending." Hiriko said. "So, Aang, will you please teach us how to airbend?"

Aang gave it some thought before saying "I'll try. But this'll be my first time teaching anyone."

"Well, there's a first time for everything." I said to him and he smiled.

With that, we began our airbending training with Aang. We started with simple ones like air blasts, air bombs, air cushions, air punches, air kicks, and air swipes. I was able to get through them easily. They were a bit similar to firebending. Even Aang was impressed I even advanced so far. Hiriko, on the other hand, we'll just say she was a bit of late bloomer. Aang even began to teach me things like air manipulation, air funnels, air shields, air wheels, breath of air, Aang's own air scooter, even some master level techniques like air blades, air propulsion, and air spouts. With all that Aang saw that I fully mastered airbending and told Hiriko she would get there and it was hard for him when he first started. With that, he continued teaching Hiriko while I then started training with Katara. That's when it got really hard for me. I was struggling as much as Hiriko.

No matter how hard I tried, I still couldn't do it as good as Katara. Though what got me a little ticked was Aang showboating his waterbending skills. The over-the-head flare was a bit much. She tried to teach me how to make a bubble, but I ended up popping it over me. She told me the key was getting the right wrist movement. It wasn't long until it reached night that Katara said we would continue my training in the morning, we all went to bed, but I only woke up and went off to practice my waterbending until I got it right. I tried to do the water whip, but I ended up dropping it. I did it again and again and again. After failing my fourth try, I then gave up and slumped down in depression. I was never gonna get this down. Seiichi was right. Maybe I wasn't cut out to be a Waterbender or the Avatar. With that, I then decided to go back to camp, but I instantly hid when I saw Fire Nation soldiers there.

From behind a tree, I watched as they caught everybody and made sure they couldn't escape. Leading them was a male soldier about my age with red flame hair, pale skin, and blue eyes. I managed to hear what he said before he left, taking them with him.

"Looks like we got some luck finding you here." The boy said to Aang. "Prince Zuko will be pleased to see we finally got the Avatar. And I know this'll bring out the other one as well, making this whole hunt worth it." He then turned to the soldiers. "Take them to the ship. I'll inform Zuko of our latest catch."

Now I was in a complete predicament. If I go to Zuko's ship, I'll have to fight him. But if I don't, then my friends will be goners. What should I do? What should I do? That's what went up in my head. I was completely conflicted with myself. But I then remembered that I was one of the Avatars and their job was to keep balance in the world. If fighting with my friend was the only way to save one of this world's only hope, then I'll do it. With that, I went off to save the others. It wasn't easy. I had to sneak around the ship, avoiding the sight of the soldiers on board. The only times I did get in their sight was when they were the guards of the cells. It took me a while, but I found Katara, Sokka, Tadaaki, Seiichi, and Yosuke, who were happy to see me. Katara actually hugged me and Sokka gave me a respectful grin.

"Roku, you're here." Tadaaki said, surprised.

"I thought you didn't want to fight Zuko." Yosuke said with confusion.

"I don't, but sometimes you have to do things you don't want to do to do the right thing." I said. "We might fight, but all friends have complications." The guys then smiled at me. I then looked and saw Kioko and Hiriko weren't here. "Hey, where are the girls?"

"We're right here." Kioko said as she spooked me from behind.

"Geez! Can I not get the life scared out of me?" I said.

"Sorry." Kioko said.

"It's okay." I told her. "How did you two get out?"

"He let us out." Hiriko said as she and Kioko moved out of the way to reveal one gray bearded and haired fellow I hadn't seen on a while.

"Iroh." I said with surprise.

"Hello, Roku." Iroh said with a smile. "It is good to see you."

"You two know each other?" Tadaaki asked me, just as confused as Seiichi and Yosuke.

"Yes. Guys, meet Iroh, a retired general and Zuko's uncle." I said.

"It's good to meet you all." Iroh said. "Now hurry, you must save the Avatar before they know you're here."

"Why are you helping us?" I asked him.

It was confusing that the Fire Lord's brother would be helping us.

"Because you are the Avatar and it is your duty to bring balance to the world." Iroh answered, shocking all of us.

"You knew?" I asked. "How?"

"Your father," Iroh said, "before his execution, he confined in me the secret to the Fire Dragon lineage. A secret I had kept all these years."

"So you knew I was one of the Avatars the entire time?" I asked. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Your father wanted you to find out on your own, so you could learn the very responsibility of your bloodline." Iroh said. "He knew if you knew of it, your goal to succeed in fulfilling your destiny would cloud your judgement. You had to learn in order to grow into a true leader. If he were here right now, he would be proud of the man you've become."

I smiled for his kind words and then said "Thank you, Iroh."

"Don't mention it." Iroh said. "Now, hurry."

"Right." I said, getting serious. "Let's go!"

We then went off to find Aang and found his cell. We then took out the guards and got Aang out. We were heading to the upper deck and thought we were home free, but we stopped as we saw the one person I was afraid to face. He turned around as he noticed us. He was still the same as when he left: a ponytail as by royal tradition. And his face had healed to where it only scarred only his left eye and the parts around it. He was about as shocked as I was to see me on his ship.

"Roku?" Zuko said.

"Zuko." I said nervously. "How's it going, bud?"

"What are you doing here?" Zuko asked as he stood there right in the middle of the deck. He then looked to see Aang, who I saw have a serious look. "Why is the Avatar out of his cell?"

I then took some thought on what I should say and then chose the right words to use.

"The reason he's out is because I'm helping him escape." I said, both shocking and enraging him.

"What?!" Zuko said. "Roku, this is none of your business. Leave now and I shall spare you from the charges."

My team was ready to fight him, but I stopped them and stepped up to where I was halfway to Zuko. If anyone was gonna show who we are, it was gonna be me.

"If you want Aang, you'll have to get through me." I said with a serious look.

"Roku, stand aside." Zuko ordered.

"No." I said, taking stance.

"Roku, that's an order!" Zuko said as soldiers appeared to help him fight. "Now stand down!"

"I'm sorry, Zuko." I told him. "But I can't let you take Aang."

"Why are you even helping him?" Zuko said. "Do you even know the punishment you'll receive by betraying the Fire Nation?"

"Do you know what the Fire Nation has done to destroy the Avatars?" I asked him. "The only people who have been keeping balance in this world since the beginning?"

"That is all ancient history. What you are doing now is a crime of treason."

"Open your eyes, Zuko! This whole war has done nothing but bring destruction and misery to all four nations. Our nation has been sinned with creating this very imbalance. The Air Nation has been left to gather dust, most of the Waterbenders in the South Pole are gone, and now the Earth Nation is being destroyed. I saw that for myself as I witnessed it when I saw most of a great forest burnt to the ground. Do you really think that capturing the Avatar will solve anything?"

"Roku, you know that I need him." Zuko said. "If I don't have him in my custody, I can't…"

"Go home?" I finished him. "Well, I can't do that either. Not until I stop Fire Lord Ozai. Why do you think I'm out here in the first place? Ozai has done nothing, but give people pain and misery. That's why all of us are doing this, Zuko. Not just to save the homes of our own, but all who live in this world. Seiichi and Yosuke came all this way from the North Pole because they couldn't stand to let this war consume their home. Tadaaki left his village because he didn't wish to watch as the Fire Nation tried to take the nation he was born in. Those reasons also go for Kioko, Hiriko, and me. Zuko, your father is no better than Sozin nor any of the Fire Lords that proceed that ancestor of yours. His reign is effecting everyone, even you. He banished your mother, he left you scarred for life. He took my father's life. You of all people should under-stand how I can't forgive him. Ozai won't stop until he destroys everything!"

"I can't let this happen to anyone else. I cannot stand by and watch families become divided and their homes be destroyed. Now I ask of you, Zuko. Let us go or face my fury."

Zuko actually started giving some thought to my words and the others were amazed by this, by how I was willing to save this world and end the war. I waited for Zuko's response, but was a little ashamed for the actions he decided for me.

"I'm sorry, Roku." Zuko said with a grim glare. "But I can't return home a failure."

He then gave the signal for the soldiers to prepare their attack.

"Then I'm also sorry, Zuko." I said as I got ready to attack. "But I have to fulfill my destiny."

With that, I then used an air swipe on them, causing most of the soldiers to be knocked on the deck with Zuko while the rest were knocked off the ship from being too close to the railing. This was what surprised Zuko.

"You can airbend? But how…?" Zuko asked. When I revealed my tail, he got his answer. "You're the other Avatar?!"

"Mm-hm." I answered him. "My Avatar lineage runs in the family. Thanks to Aang, I've now mastered airbending."

Zuko then growled and said "You won't get away from. Capture them!"

"Element Gang, let the elements strike!" I said as me and my team got ready to fight. With this fight, it was filled with soldiers getting either bended or tossed overboard. Aang and the others joined in on it.

"Roku, do you know how to get us out of here?" Tadaaki asked me.

"Actually, I didn't think this far with a fight." I said. I then looked to Aang and the others. "Do any of you three have something that can help us here?"

"I do." Aang said as he pulled out a whistle.

It was weirdly shaped. It looked like a white buffalo. He then took a deep breath and blew into it. The sound it made was so loud that I had to cover my ears.

"Oh, my ears!" I yelled in pain.

I was able to hear everyone's conversation even though that sound was echoing in my head.

"What's wrong with Roku?" Sokka asked.

"Must be Aang's whistle." Tadaaki answered. "It must be too loud for him."

"How can he hear it?" Katara asked.

"Roku is a Fire Dragon, he's got stronger senses than we do." Seiichi answered. "He can hear anything from miles away."

After Aang stopped, I then tried to balance myself before looking at him.

"What was that for?" I asked him angrily and he looked at me with a nervous smile.

I soon got my answer when I looked to see a creature that showed Airbenders the very techniques of airbending. It was the one species of beast I'd never thought I'd see. There it was, flying towards us…an air bison. Aang told me he had one named Appa and there was no doubt that was him. With that, me and the group decided to take our leave and went over to Appa. I managed to get us to stop so I could speak to Zuko and give him a little advice.

"In honor of our friendship, I'll spare you, Zuko. But if you continue on this path, I shall give you no mercy." I said, looking down on him as his ship laid there on the open water. "There is another way for you to return home, but it doesn't lie with Ozai. With this said, I'll now make sure you cannot follow us."

With that, I then concentrated and began to bend. Everyone was amazed as I managed to create a huge wave and crash it onto Zuko's ship, causing it to sink. We then began our departure. I looked back and saw Zuko reaching the shore and I knew he was now glaring at me. After that, we then rode on the saddle on Appa's back as he flew amongst the clouds.

"Roku, that was amazing!" Katara said, congratulating me. "You were able to water-bend."

"Yeah, it was impressive…for a Firebender." Yosuke said with an actual compliment.

"Thanks." I said with a smile, which then faded away with my depression. "But now Zuko will begin hunting me down and no doubt let the Fire Nation know I'm the Avatar."

I looked to Sokka as he put a hand on my shoulder and gave me a smile.

"Yeah, so what?" he said. "You managed to save us and sink a navy ship. Not many people can do that."

"Yeah, but I know Zuko." I said. "He doesn't give up that easily. Me and the gang don't really have anywhere to go or hide to get the Fire Nation off our tails."

"Why not stick with us?" Aang asked as we all looked to him.

"Really? You don't mind having six more people with you?" Tadaaki asked.

"Nope. The more, the merrier." Aang said. "And Roku, I would stop moping if I were you. You already mastered airbending and getting closer to mastering waterbending. What's there to worry about?"

I then saw that he was right. I was now halfway to mastering all four elements and, by sticking around him, Katara, and Sokka, we would have transportation. Not to mention the fact I had a waterbending teacher and we still had a long way to the North Pole. Very much we only had one option to do and it was the best for all of us.

"Well, you got me there." I said with a chuckle. "Looks like our group got a little bigger."

"So we're sticking with them?" Seiichi asked.

"Yep." I answered. "I mean I know Hiriko wants to master airbending, me and Aang need to master all four elements, and I still need to learn how to waterbend like Katara. With the Fire Nation now chasing us, the best thing to do is to stick together on this journey."

Everybody was ecstatic about it, especially Hiriko because we now had an airbending teacher for her along with another girl in the group.

"So, from here on out, no matter what happens, we'll work together as a team." I said and they all agreed.

With that, we then set off on our journey. All of us, together. Nothing was gonna stop us. As long as we stick together, there was nothing we couldn't do. Me and Aang will master all four elements, defeat Ozai, and save the world.


	7. Chapter 6: Jet

**Chapter 6: Jet**

There we were, on our first day together on this journey. We decided to make camp in a forest due to Appa needing to take a few breaks from flying. It was really kind of tiring for him. Also we need to make some stops to eat or sleep. It all seemed peaceful until I hear something clang.

"Where's Momo?" Aang asked as he looked around.

Even though the others didn't seem to care, I looked around and saw the lemur was gone. We all then heard him screech and went out to find him. We managed to find cage traps hanged by rope on tree limbs. In one of them was Momo.

"Hang on, Momo!" Aang said as he went off to help the lemur.

I went off to help the other animals in the other two cages. We used our airbending to jump from tree to tree to get to the cages. What I found were two hog monkeys. While Aang lowered Momo's, I used my strength to open the other cages, helping the hog monkeys to escape. Luckily the cages weren't embedded with Vengestone. I watched as the hog monkeys gave their thanks to me and ran off. I looked to see Momo's cage on the ground and, climbing down, I watched as Sokka and Katara opened the cage. After doing so, Momo ran out with a lychee nut in his mouth, got on his hind legs, and ate it like nothing happened, much to Sokka's frustration. Everyone gathered around as I examined Momo's cage.

"These are Fire Nation traps," I said as I recognized it, "you can tell by the metalwork. We better pack up camp and get moving."

We then went back to camp, gathered up our things, and were about to load them on Appa. But Sokka stopped us before we could finish.

"Uh-uh." Sokka said, making us stop packing on Appa. "No flying this time."

"What?" Aang asked, confused by what Sokka said. "Why wouldn't we fly?"

"Think about it." Sokka said as he took the sleeping bag from Aang. "Somehow Prince Zuko and the Fire Nation keep finding us."

"Yeah. What's your point?" I asked.

"It's because they spot Appa, he's just too noticeable." Sokka answered.

"What?" Katara said, angrily. "Appa's not too noticeable!"

"He's a gigantic fluffy monster with an arrow on his head!" Sokka condescendingly said, pointing dramatically at Appa. "It's kinda hard to miss him!"

The bison only yawned like Sokka didn't really said that. He had a point. It wasn't like there was anyone else with an air bison.

"Sokka's just jealous ʹcause he doesn't have an arrow." Aang said to Appa as he sat comfortably on the animal's head.

"I know you all wanna fly, but my instincts tell me we should play it safe this time and walk." Sokka said as he stood next to Tadaaki.

"Who made you the boss?" Tadaaki asked with a scowl.

"I'm not the boss, I'm the leader." Sokka said to him, pointing to his chest.

"You're the leader?" Tadaaki said, laughing. "But you're voice cracks!"

"I'm the oldest and I'm a warrior, so…" Sokka said. When he realized his voice cracked, he deepened it and said "I'm the leader!"

"Oldest?" I said to him. "You and I are the same age! Besides, if anyone's the leader, it's me and Aang. I mean we _are_ the Avatars."

"Are you kidding?" Sokka said to me. "He's just a goofy kid!"

"He's right." Aang said while he hanged upside-down from Appa's right horn with his feet sticking out in the air.

"Why do boys always think someone has to be the leader?" Katara said as we all looked to her. "I bet you wouldn't be so boss if you kissed a girl."

"I've kissed a girl." Sokka said defensively. "You just haven't met her."

"Who? Gran-Gran?" Katara said amused. "I've met Gran-Gran."

"I think he means Suki." I said to her. I then looked to Sokka. "By the way, a kiss on the cheek doesn't count as kissing a girl."

"Like you would know!" Sokka said, throwing his arms into the air. "Look, my instincts tell me we have a better chance of slipping through on foot and a leader has to trust his instincts."

"Actually that is a good idea." I said. "We've been able to avoid the Fire Nation soldiers for years by going on foot. Until the Fire Nation loses our trail, we might need to walk."

"Walking might be fun." Aang said as he stepped over, wearing a backpack with Momo on top.

"Then it's settled." I said as I got my bag. "We're walking."

With this, we gathered our bags and began walking with me leading the group. Though it was only sometime later that there were some complaints from Katara and Aang, who were trudging along with Sokka and Appa.

"Walking stinks!" Aang said. "How do people go anywhere without a flying bison?"

"Well, I don't know, Aang." Katara said sarcastically. "Why don't you ask Sokka's instincts? They seem to know everything.

"Ha, ha, very funny." Sokka said sarcastically.

"I'm tired of carrying this pack." Aang complained.

"You know who you should ask to carry it for a while? Sokka's instincts." Katara said, making Sokka to look at her irritated.

"That's a great idea." Aang said. He then looked to Sokka. "Hey, Sokka's instincts, would you mind…"

"Okay, okay, I get it." Sokka said.

"Guys, mind being a little quiet?" I said as we headed through a bush. "Speak any louder and you'll might attract the Fire… Nation."

We all then stopped and saw a Fire Nation campsite with a lot of soldiers. Most of them were seated or crouched near the fire with bowls in their hands and a couple of them sat close to the tents, which had the Fire Nation emblem on the door flap. One of these soldiers had a patch over his left eye. When they noticed us, I told everyone to run. We turned to run, but we were blocked by a Firebender setting the plants behind us on fire along with Sokka's shirt which Katara managed to put out with waterbending.

"If you let us pass, we promise not to hurt you." Sokka said to the soldiers.

"What are you doing?" I asked in a whisper.

"Bluffing?" he whispered to me.

" _You_ promise not to hurt _us?_ " the eye-patched soldier said before he somehow got knocked out.

"Nice work, Sokka!" Aang said, amazed. "How'd you do that?"

"Uh, instinct?" Sokka said, just as unsure as I was.

That was weird. How did that soldier get knocked out? It couldn't have been any of us. This left question on who did that.

"Look!" Katara said as she pointed up a tree.

That was when I got my answer on who knocked out the soldier. In that tree, I saw a man wearing shoulder guards, leg guards, black pants, a black, long sleeve shirt with a red, no sleeve shirt on top of it, with brown scruffy hair and brown eyes. He looked close to my age and wielded two hook swords. Though this only left to find out whether he was friend or foe. He then jumped and took down two soldiers. He then ran forward to two more.

"Down you go!" the man said as he took them down. While Katara, Hiriko, and Kioko were amazed and Aang was shocked, me and the guys were just confused on who this guy was and why he was helping us. A complete stranger actually helping us like this was pretty strange. Another soldier charges at him, but he is defeated by the man.

"They're in the trees!" a soldier said.

Then a young boy landed on top of the soldier and turned his helmet around while laughing. Another boy launched arrows at the soldiers while more boys came out of the trees. We joined the fight and I managed to see Sokka hold up his boomerang and yelled as a soldier approached him, but stopped when that man took him down first.

"Hey, he was mine!" Sokka said, frustrated at the man for taking his victory.

"Gotta be quicker next time." The man said as he went off to rejoin the battle.

Sokka looked dismayed, so I looked away and watched as a huge boy fell out of the trees and easily took down two soldiers as the man skillfully took down one more, causing that soldier's weapon to hit another soldier, who was going to battle Sokka, in the head and made the soldier fall down.

"Man!" Sokka angrily said for he didn't fight any soldiers.

I then watched as the man disarmed another soldier and ran up to Katara.

"Hey." The man said to her with a smile.

"Hi." Katara said with a gentle smile.

After this, the entire camp was now empty.

"You just took out a whole army almost single-handed." Aang said amazed.

"Army?" Sokka disdainfully said. "There were only like twenty guys."

"Sokka's right. That was only a squadron." I said. I then looked and walked toward the man. "Okay. Who are you guys?"

"I'll be asking the questions. Starting…" the man said before he tripped me and put the blade to my throat. "What are you doing in our forest, Firebender?"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" I said, trying to fix the misunderstanding. "Hold on! I'm not your enemy!"

I then revealed my tail and he looked at me with shock. He then removed the blade and put both his swords away.

"My mistake." The man said as he helped me up. "I didn't know you were the Avatar."

"It's fine." I told him. "Get that all the time. My name's Roku. This is Tadaaki, Sokka, Seiichi, my cousin Hiriko, Kioko, Katara, Aang, and Yosuke."

"Nice to meet you." The man said. "My name is Jet and these are my Freedom Fighters: Sneers, Longshot, Smellerbee, The Duke, and Pipsqueak."

When I got to see them, I saw how different they were from each other. Longshot was a male archer with black hair wearing a conical hat, a blue gi, and a red cloth like a cape. Smeller-bee was dressed in light armor, wore black boots and white gloves, a black headband, and a brown belt. It didn't take me long to realize Smellerbee was a brown hair girl. She had swords and daggers in hand and red lines on her cheeks. Sneers wore Earth Nation armor, a fur coat, and had his hair in a bun. The only people I was confused by was The Duke and Pipsqueak. I couldn't figure out which was which. One of them was a little fella wearing Earth Nation clothing and a helmet and the other was a big fella with a red headband. Though I got my answer when Aang went over and looked at the kid.

"Ha, ha, Pipsqueak, that's a funny name." Aang laughed.

I then watched as the big fella threateningly loomed over Aang.

"You think my name is funny?" the boy said in a low, growling tone.

It surprised me that he was Pipsqueak. That was ironic due to the fact he was so big. I also wondered why that sniffling kid was called "The Duke" for. Aang looked taken aback for a second until he got his grin back.

"It's hilarious!" Aang said upbeat to Pipsqueak.

For a second there it looked like Pipsqueak was gonna pumble Aang. But I was surprised when he started laughing with Aang and The Duke joining them. Pipsqueak then friendly patted Aang on the back, though the hit was hard enough to knock the Airbender flat on the ground. The Duke stopped laughing and we both looked down at Aang sprawled on the ground before his feet, his face flat in the dirt. Though, when Aang raised his head and continued laughing, so did The Duke. We stayed around as the Freedom Fighters began raiding the camp to see if they needed any help, though I wish I didn't have to see Hiriko and Kioko love-dazed over Jet.

"Umm, thanks for saving us, Jet." Katara nervously said as she approached Jet. "We're lucky you were there."

"I should be thanking you." Jet said to her. "We were waiting to ambush those soldiers all morning, we just need the right distraction and then you guys stumbled in."

"We were relying on instincts." Katara said, eying Sokka.

"You'll get yourself killed doing that." Jet said.

Sokka looked disdainfully at them while The Duke and Pipsqueak looked through the barrels.

"Hey, Jet, these barrels are filled of blasting jelly." The Duke said.

"That's a great score." Jet said to him.

"And there's boxes are filled with jelly candy." Pipsqueak said as he carried a large box.

"Also good, let's not get these mixed up." Jet said.

"We'll take this stuff back to the hideout." The Duke said.

"You guys have a hideout?" Aang said, surprised.

"You wanna see it?" Jet asked.

The girls agreed in an instant in excitement, which made Jet smile at them.

"We're here." Jet said after we gotten to a different spot in the forest, but there wasn't anything around.

"Where? There's nothing here." Sokka said.

"Hold this." Jet said as he gave a rope to Sokka.

"Why? What's this do?" Sokka asked skeptically. He then screamed as he was pulled up into the branches.

"Aang?" Jet said, offering him another rope.

"I'll get up on my own." Aang said. He then began leaping into trees with airbending.

Jet tried to offer me a rope, but I declined and flew up there. I managed to find a wooden platform in the trees. It was pretty impressive and got a good view of the forest. I was soon joined by the others with Katara holding onto Jet. Aang was zip lining through the trees.

"Nice place you got!" Aang said as he passed through with Momo.

"It's beautiful up here!" Katara said amazed.

"It's beautiful…" Jet said. "…and more importantly, the Fire Nation can't find us."

"They would love to find you." Smellerbee said as she landed between Katara and Jet. "Wouldn't they, Jet?"

"It's not gonna happen, Smellerbee." Jet said to her.

"Why does the Fire Nation want to find you?" Katara asked as Aang zipped by again.

"I guess you could say I've been causing them a little trouble." Jet answered. "See, they took over a nearby Earth Kingdom town a few years back."

"We've been ambushin' their troops, cutting off their supply lines, and doing anything we can to mess with ʹem." Pipsqueak said.

Sokka started hopping around, trying to get past Pipsqueak. I began to give some thought on what Pipsqueak said. It seemed familiar.

"One day, we'll drive the Fire Nation out of here for good and free that town." Jet said.

"That's so brave." Katara said.

"Yeah, nothing's braver than a guy in a tree house." Sokka sarcastically said, after main-aging to get by Pipsqueak.

"Don't pay attention to my brother." Katara said.

"No problem." Jet told her. "He probably had a rough day."

"So, you all live here?" Katara asked as Sokka sunk behind them.

"That's right. Longshot over there?" Jet said as we looked to see Longshot and The Duke walking without making a sound. "His town got burned down by the Fire Nation. And we found The Duke trying to steal our food. I don't think he ever really had a home."

"What about you?"

The others passed by while I stood behind Katara and Jet as they came to a halt.

"The Fire Nation killed my parents." Jet said. "I was only eight years old. That day changed me forever."

"Sokka and I lost our mother to the Fire Nation." Katara said with a depressed look.

"And my father was executed by the Fire Lord." I said as they turned to look at me.

"I'm sorry." Jet said.

I still had concern about the Freedom Fighters, so I tried to keep an eye on Jet. The hideout had lanterns hanged between the branches with rope. Though I only saw them on a suspension bridge. At dinner, sentries kept watch on the upper levels while we sat at the banquet table. While we ate, Jet stood on the table.

"Today, we struck another blow against the Fire Nation swine." Jet said and everyone cheered. The girls and Aang smiled while Sokka just scowled. "I got a special joy from the look on one soldier's face when The Duke dropped down on his helmet and rode him like a wild hog monkey." The Duke then climbed up onto the table with his arms in the air. "Now, the Fire Nation thinks they don't have to worry about a couple of kids hiding in the trees." Jet prepared to take a drink from his wooden cup. "Maybe they're right." The Freedom Fighters gave a very loud and long boo and Jet gave an angry look. "Or maybe…they're dead wrong." The group gave a loud and long cheer.

"Hey, Jet, nice speech." Katara said.

"Thanks." Jet said. "By the way, I was really impressed with you guys. Especially you and Aang. That was some great bending I saw out there today."

"Well, he's great. He's the Avatar." Katara said as she continued with a blush. "I could use some more training."

"Two Avatars, huh?" Jet said. " _Very_ nice."

"Thanks, Jet." Aang said.

"So I might know a way that you guys can help in our struggle." Jet said.

"Unfortunately, we have to leave tonight." Sokka said as he started walking away.

"Sokka, you're kidding me!" Jet said to him. "I needed you and Roku on an important mission tomorrow."

"What mission?" Sokka curiously asked as he turned around.

It turned out to be recon for any soldiers with me, Sokka, Jet, Pipsqueak, and Smellerbee. Jet and the two Freedom Fighters used birdcalls to signal each other. While on watch, Sokka jammed his knife into the trunk of the tree we were in as a way of hearing vibrations of any soldier. That impressed both me and Jet.

"Hear anything?" I asked him.

"Nothing yet." Sokka said as he had his ear to the handle of the knife. Then he whispered "Wait! Yes, someone's approaching."

"How many?" Jet whispered.

"I think there's just one." Sokka said.

Jet then signaled the others before saying "Good work, Sokka. Now get ready."

Both me and Sokka got ready to fight, but we stood down when we saw it was only an old man.

"Wait, false alarm." I said. "He's just an old man."

But Jet ignored me and prepared to attack the old man, leaping to the ground in front of him. Both me and Sokka watched in horror.

"What are you doing in our woods, you leech?" Jet asked him.

"Please, sir, I'm just a traveler." The old man said.

Jet took a step and, with one swipe, sent the man's can flying from his hand. The old man backed away, but when he tried to flee the way he came, he ran face into Pipsqueak's chest. The force from the impact knocked him to the ground, where Pipsqueak loomed over him. The old man tried to crawl away, but Pipsqueak pinned him by putting his foot on his backside.

"Do you like destroying towns? Do you like destroying families? Do you?" Jet said, aggressively.

"Oh…" the old man said, pleading. "Please, let me go…have mercy."

"Does the Fire Nation let people go?" Jet said, preparing to kick the old man. "Does the Fire Nation have mercy?"

That's when me and Sokka moved in, Sokka stopping the kick by snagging Jet's foot with his club.

"Jet, he's just an old man!" I said, after his foot was released.

"He's Fire Nation!" Jet said to me. He then turned to the Freedom Fighters. "Search him!"

Pipsqueak held him and Smellerbee stepped up to search the poor man.

"But he's not hurting anyone!" Sokka said, just as concerned as I was.

"Have you forgotten that the Fire Nation killed your mother or your father?" Jet said to us. "Remember why you fight!"

"We've got his stuff, Jet." Smellerbee said as she held up the old man's bag.

The old man was then thrown back on the ground.

"This isn't right!" I said angrily.

"It's what has to be done, now let's get outta here." Jet said as he pushed past me and Sokka and left, Smellerbee and Pipsqueak followed.

I looked to the old man as he was still on his hands and knees in pity. I then used my powers to grab his cane and give it back to him. I told him he should probably get out of the forest and he agreed, thanking me before he continued his walk and used his cane to support him. When Jet called to us, both me and Sokka ran to catch up with the others. When we got back, we were met by Aang who came over to us on the zip line with Momo.

"Hey, guys! Look what The Duke gave me!" Aang said as he showed us a bag he was wearing and pulled out a small pellet from it. With a sly grin, he tossed it next to Momo, where it exploded with a pop. Momo puffed up in fright, then hissed and lunged for the bag. After getting onto Aang's shoulder, Momo began tossing several pellets at his feet, causing the Airbender to dance wildly about. "Ow! Quit it!"

Though it was funny, both me and Sokka ignored him and continued on. We both sat down with our backs to the tree trunk and glared at the ground, still angry for what Jet did.

"Hey, guys." Katara said as she walked up to us. "Is Jet back?"

"Yeah, he's back." I told her. "But we're leaving."

That shocked both her and Aang.

"What?" Aang said as he looked at us.

That's when the others showed up, just as shocked as the two.

"But me and Katara made him this hat." Hiriko said as she showed us a cap made out of stitched leaves with a flower on top.

"That guy is a thug." I said to them, my look unchanged.

"What? No, he's not." Katara said, defiantly.

"He's messed up, Katara." Sokka said to her.

"He's not messed up, he's just got a different way of life, a really fun way of life." Aang said.

"He beat and robbed a harmless old man!" I told them. "We can't trust him."

"I wanna hear Jet's side of the story." Katara said.

When we confronted Jet and Katara told him of what I told her and asked if it was true.

"Roku, you told them what happened, but you didn't mention that the guy was Fire Nation?" Jet said as he sat on a hammock-bed and while the rest of us stood.

Me and Sokka stood as far away as we could get. Aang wore the hat Hiriko and Katara made, which made him look ridiculous.

"No, he conveniently left that part out." Katara said.

"Yes, he was Fire Nation." I said. "But he was still a harmless civilian."

"He was an assassin, Roku." Jet said as he pulled out a knife and thrust it into a nearby stump. It was a sinister looking blade with four spikes evenly along the grip with enough space for the fingers and a ring on the butt of the knife. "See? There's a compartment for poison in the knife." He then pulled on the ring and removed a small glass tube with red liquid. "He was sent to eliminate me. You and Sokka helped save my life."

"The only life I saved was the life of that old man." I said to him. "Nice try, but I know that knife belongs to you and there is no possible way that old man was an assassin. Something you wouldn't care on becoming as much as what you've already became."

"Roku, what are you talking about?" Tadaaki asked.

"Jet and his group are wanted criminals of the Fire Nation." I said.

"Yeah, so?" Tadaaki said.

"The reason they're wanted is because they have beaten and robbed members of the Fire Nation." I said. "Not just soldiers, but dozens of innocent citizens."

This shocked the guys. I knew this information because, while I was still in the Fire Nation, I had heard of bandits that attack and rob anyone from the Fire Nation that enters the forest. These were people I would gladly let rot in jail.

"Now, if anyone of you don't want to join them as they face their punishment, I would suggest we leave and let them dig their own pit." I said. "Anyone with me?"

"I'm with you." Tadaaki said. "You are from the Fire Nation, so I'm gonna take your word for it."

"Me too." Seiichi said.

"I'm up for it." Yosuke said.

"Same goes for me." Sokka said.

"Then it's settled." I said. "We're leaving. Come on, let's pack up and head out."

With this, me and the guys left to pack up everything. After getting all my stuff packed and seeing Tadaaki, Seiichi, and Yosuke were ready to go in the morning, I went off to check on Sokka. When I got there, I managed to hear the argument between him and his sister with the girls and Aang too.

"We can't leave now with the Fire Nation about to burn down a forest!" Katara said.

"I'm sorry, Katara." Sokka said. "Jet's very smooth, but, like Roku said, we can't trust him."

"You know what I think?" Katara said. "You're jealous that he's a better warrior and a better leader!"

"Katara, I'm not jealous of Jet." Sokka said. "It's just that my instinct…"

"Well, _my_ instincts tell me we need to stay her a little longer and help Jet." Katara said. "Come on, Aang."

"Sorry, Sokka." Aang said as he and Katara left the hut.

I've gotten the same from Hiriko and Kioko that they didn't want to leave. But that night, while we were sleeping, I heard someone say "Let's go." I wasn't the only one for both Seiichi and Sokka woke up the same time I did. We went outside to see the Freedom Fighters descending on the rope lines. With this, we decided to follow them. We watched as they pushed a loaded wagon out of the camp with Jet leading them. It was strange that they were out here so late, especially with soldiers coming to burn the forest. After going through a dark valley, we followed them to a dam, the reservoir behind it was low. We looked back at the wagon to see the Fighters unloading barrels from the wagon and placing them on the dam. This brought up the question: why would the Freedom Fighters be here?

I was also curious about those barrels they brought. What would they need them for? We listened from a bush to find our answer.

"Now listen, you are not to blow the dam until I give the signal." Jet said to his followers. "If the reservoir isn't full, the Fire Nation troops could survive."

"But what about the people in town?" The Duke asked as he jumped off the wagon. "Won't they get wiped out too?"

"Look, Duke, that's the price of ridding this area of the Fire Nation." Jet said as he put a hand on The Duke's shoulder. He then looked to Longshot. "Now don't blow the dam until I give the signal, got it?" Longshot nodded "yes".

This shocked all three of us.

"I can't believe this." Seiichi said quietly. He then looked to me. "Are they seriously gonna blow up the dam?"

"No doubt about it." I said quietly. "And they're using the blasting jelly to do it. I know an Earth Nation village in the valley. If they blast the dam, the village and its villagers will be washed away."

"But what about the soldiers and the forest?" Seiichi asked. "We need water to put out the fire."

"Don't you get it, Seiichi?" Sokka said at the same volume. "There aren't any soldiers. Jet just said that so the forest will be flooded enough to destroy everything upstream. He's going to trick Aang and Katara into helping him."

"And to think you didn't seem that bright." I said, surprised. "We need to warn the others."

Before we could even leave, we ran into Pipsqueak, who dragged us out into the open. Pipsqueak held Sokka by his wolf-tail.

"Where do you think you're going, pony-tail?" Smellerbee sneeringly said as she held a knife to Sokka's throat.

The two dragged all three of us out between them where Jet saw us sitting by the edge of the cliff.

"Guys, I'm so glad you can join us." Jet said.

Pipsqueak and Smellerbee brought us to our knees and we scowled at Jet.

"We heard your plan to destroy the Earth Kingdom town." Sokka said.

"Our plan is to rid the valley of the Fire Nation." Jet said.

"There are people that live there, Jet." I said. "Mothers, fathers, and children."

"We can't win without making some sacrifices." Jet said.

"You lied to Katara and Aang!" Seiichi said to him.

"Because they don't understand the demands of war. Not like me, Roku, or Sokka do."

"No. You don't understand." I said to him. "This is not about destroying the Fire Nation. It's about saving the other nations. That's the difference between you and us. Do you really think this'll solve anything? If you do this, you'll be responsible for taking dozens of innocent lives! You might think you understand the war, but you don't understand us."

"He's right." Sokka said to Jet. "And we understand that there's nothing you won't do to get what you want."

Jet gave some thought before giving us a depressed look and said "I was hoping you two would have open minds, but I can see you've made your choice."

That's when Pipsqueak and Smellerbee were about to grab us. Before we could react, Jet used his swords to trip us and allowed the Freedom Fighters to capture us with Pipsqueak carrying me and Seiichi and Smellerbee and Smellerbee and Pipsqueak holding Sokka's arms behind his back as they carried us out.

"I can't let you three to warn Katara and Aang." Jet said to us. He then looked to the Fighters. "Take them for a walk, a long walk."

"You can't do this!" I said as me and the guys tried to struggle free.

"Cheer up." Jet said with a grin. "We're gonna win a great victory against the Fire Nation today."

It reached morning and we were still in the custody of the Freedom Fighter who were leading us down a path to who knew where.

"Come on, move along!" Smellerbee said as she shoved Sokka.

Sokka stumbled but kept on his feet.

"How can you stand by and do nothing while Jet wipes out an entire village?" I asked them.

"Hey, listen, Roku, Jet's a great leader." Pipsqueak said. "We follow what he says and things always turn out okay."

"If that's the way Jet leads, then he's got a lot to learn." Sokka said as he sprinted off in the direction of some leaf-piles.

When I saw the nuts on the piles I realized what he was doing. Smellerbee tried to grab him, but failed.

"Hey!" Smellerbee said as she and Pipsqueak chased after Sokka.

While Sokka avoided the piles, Smellerbee and Pipsqueak ran right into them, snaring them a feet in the air and making Pipsqueak drop us on the ground.

"Good idea tricking them into the traps." I said to Sokka.

"Thanks." Sokka said to me. He then looked at the two caged Fighters. "Hey, while you two are up there, you might want to practice your knot work." He then held the restraints that held his arms behind his back. He then looked to me and Seiichi. "Now, let's save that village."

"But there's no way we'll make it to the dam in time." Seiichi said.

"We're not going to the dam." Sokka said. "Come on."

With that, we then followed Sokka through the forest, leaving the two Freedom Fighters in the snares. We got this from the others. After Aang and Katara were done with flooding the forest, them and the others went off to meet up with Jet at the base of the dam where they saw the rest of the Freedom Fighters unloading the last barrels of blasting jelly onto the dam.

"What are they doing?" Hiriko asked.

"Hey, those are the red barrels he got from the Fire Nation." Aang said as he saw the barrels.

"Why would they need blasting jelly?" Kioko asked.

"Because Jet's gonna blow up the dam." Aang answered, horrified.

This shocked the others for what Jet and his group were doing.

"What? No, that would destroy the town." Katara said as Aang got out his glider. "Jet wouldn't do that."

"I've gotta stop him." Aang said as he got ready to take off.

"Jet wouldn't do that." Katara said, less convinced in what she was saying.

Before Aang could take off, Jet crossed his path from behind and took his glider, causing Aang to wobble precariously on the cliff. Luckily, he used his airbending to stable himself.

"Yes, I would." Jet said as he stood in front of the trees and they all turned to him.

"Jet, why?" Katara asked.

"Katara, you would too if you just stopped to think." Jet said to her. "Think about what the Fire Nation did to your mother. We can't let them do that to anyone else ever again."

"This isn't the answer!"

"I want you to understand me, Katara." Jet said. "I thought your brother and Roku would understand, but…"

"Where's Sokka?" Katara said with tears falling from her eyes.

"Katara." Jet said, reaching out and touching her face.

Katara lowered her head and, with a shout, sent Jet flying with the water from her water skin. She drew it back into the skin after she was done.

"I need to get to that dam." Aang said.

He then tried to get his closed glider off the ground, but Jet used his swords to take it.

"You're not going anywhere without your glider." Jet said as he began swinging his swords at Aang, who quickly dodged the attack and retreated into a nearby tree.

"I'm not gonna fight you, Jet." Aang said to him.

"You'll have to if you want your glider back." Jet said, tauntingly.

Aang retreated back into the forest as Jet hooked the branch and pulled himself up. The others followed them from the ground as they saw the battle. Jet attacked ad Aang defended himself with balls of air, which Jet ducked from. Jet attacked head on, but Aang blacked with his arms and sent his opponent flying into a tree trunk with an air kick. Jet combined his swords and advanced. Aang avoided the flail-like move and sent another air blast. Jet stooped down and let the air flow over and past him before lunging. The chase continued through many levels of the forest. Jet caught up to Aang and sent them both freefalling, attacking as they went. They both ended up on a branch. Jet continued his attack and Aang avoided it all. Jet charged again, but Aang hit him with a jet stream of air, causing Jet to fall. Jet recovered, but lost the glider in the process. Before Aang could get to the ground, Jet kicked him into a trunk, where he landed next to his glider.

A small tributary flew past him and Aang was too slow to get up. Before Jet could take more than a step however, he was hit by a large water strike, which was made by Katara as she used the water from the river to throw Jet against the trunk of a tree. She attacked him over and over, where Jet was unable to cut the water and its force plastered him against the trunk. She then froze Jet from neck to toe.

"Why, Jet?" Katara said, furiously. "I can't believe I trusted you. You lied to me, you're sick, and I trusted you!"

She and the group were startled by a birdcall that came from the valley. Jet then gave an answering birdcall, making the group turn back to him.

"What are you doing?" Katara asked.

"You're too late." Jet said.

"No!" Katara said, horrified.

Then Aang opened up hi glider and began running to the cliff. The others soon chased after him. Aang slammed back into the ground due to his glider's wings being damaged. Katara then ran over and helped him to his feet.

"Sokka and Roku are still out there." Aang said, in pain from the fall. "They're our only chance."

"Come on, Sokka." Katara said, pleading. "I'm sorry I ever doubted you. Please."

The group watched in horror as the dam's base was destroyed, releasing a massive wall of water that got to the village, flooding it and destroying it.

"No…" Katara whimpered in horror.

"Sokka and Roku didn't make it in time." Aang said, depressed.

"All those people…" Katara said. She then turned to Jet and glared at him in rage. "Jet, you monster!"

"This was a victory, Katara. Remember that." Jet said. "The Fire Nation is gone and this valley will be safe."

"It will be safe…without you." Sokka said as him, me, Seiichi, and Momo rode on Appa and showed ourselves to a shocked Jet.

We were hiding under the cliff to add a little flare.

"Sokka!" Katara said, glad to see us.

"Roku!" Hiriko said, feeling the same.

"Seiichi!" Tadaaki said with a bright smile.

"We warned the villagers of your plan just in time." Seiichi told Jet.

"What?!" Jet said, still shocked.

"At first, they didn't believe us." I said. "The Fire Nation soldiers assumed we were spies. But one man vouched for us: the old man I helped after you attacked him. He urged them to trust us and we got everyone out in time."

It was only a thought, but I had a hunch those people were thanking us for saving them.

"You fools!" Jet said, enraged. "We could've freed this valley!"

"Who would be free?" Sokka said. "Everyone would be dead."

"You traitors!" Jet said.

"No, Jet." I said. "You became the traitor when you stopped protecting the innocent people. This is what happens when you're consumed by the pride of winning a war. Just like the Fire Lord, you just lost your heart."

"Katara." Jet pleaded. "Please, help me."

"Goodbye, Jet." Katara said grimly as she and the guys got on Appa.

"Hiriko! Kioko?" Jet said, bur was only met by disaffection turns from the girls as they joined us.

Jet glared at me as we were ready to leave him there.

"Don't worry." I said. "The soldiers will free you once they find you. That way you can take a look back at all your crimes."

"Yip, yip." Sokka said as he flicked the reigns.

With that, we went off into the sky and left Jet frozen on that tree. Once we got to the empty sky, we began talking with the rest of the group with smiles on us.

"We thought you were going to the dam." Aang said.

"We were originally." I told him. "But Sokka got the idea of evacuating the village before the flood came."

"How come you went to the town instead?" Aang asked Sokka.

"Let me guess, your instincts told you." Katara said.

"Hey, sometimes they're right." Sokka said as he shrugged his right shoulder.

"Um…Sokka?" I asked him after seeing our course. "You know we're going the wrong way, right?"

That surprised him, but he recovered with a grin on his face.

"And sometimes they're wrong." He said as he pulled the reigns, turning us to the right direction.

This day was a reminder that trusting your instincts was a valued lesson to have. Without Sokka trusting his, we wouldn't have saved the villagers. Those instincts are what helped us the most.


	8. Chapter 7: The Great Divide

**Chapter 7: The Great Divide**

There we were, setting up camp before heading out towards the Great Divide, the largest canyon in the world. Though I had no problem setting up some of the tents, Sokka was having trouble assembling his. He was all kinds of frustrated with it. It was quite a show seeing him grumble about it. While he was doing that, Katara, Hiriko, and Tadaaki came back with the fire wood and saw Sokka having trouble.

"Um, aren't you forgetting the tarp?" Katara asked her brother.

"Right, got it." Sokka said as he tossed the wrapped up tarp inside the tent.

Unlike Sokka, I set the tarps on the tents. Each member of my group has a tent. Well, four to be exact. One for the girls, one for Yosuke, one for Seiichi and Tadaaki, and one for me. Though what Sokka did wasn't really what Katara had in mind.

"Sokka, you're supposed to put the tarp _on top_ of the tent." Katara said to him. "You know, so we don't get rained on?"

"Ordinarily, you'd be right, but seeing how it's the dry, you're not." Sokka replied to his sister, gesturing widely. "Besides, that tarp makes a pretty warm blanket."

"He's got a point." Tadaaki said to Katara. "It's not like it's gonna rain."

"But what if it does rain?" Katara asked.

"What if it doesn't?" Sokka answered, widely spreading his arms in exasperation. "Then I would have put up the tarp for nothing."

"You're infuriating!" Katara said.

"Katara, why don't you worry about gathering firewood?" Sokka said. "Because, compared to what Tadaaki and Seiichi got, that kindling is looking pretty sorry."

"Well, if you don't like my firewood…" Katara angrily said as she began tossing the sticks at Sokka, who shielded himself from the wood.

After she stopped, Sokka stood up in anger.

"Fine by me, if you're not gonna do your job…" Sokka angrily said as he tore down the tent.

This was getting a little too tense for me as those two angrily stared at each other, I didn't like it when siblings fought with each other.

"Okay, we got the grub if you guys got the…" Aang said as he came back with the others.

With that, the siblings turned away from each other in anger, with their arms folded.

"Hey, where's the campfire?" Aang asked, confused. "And what happened to the tent?"

"Why don't you ask Miss Know-It-All, Queen of the Twigs?" Sokka answered.

"Oh, yeah?" Katara said. "Well, you're Mister Lazy Bum, King of the… Tents!"

She threw a twig at Sokka's head and he turned around and looked at her angrily. And I thought hanging out with Azula was bad.

Aang just laughed and said "Okay, listen, guys, harsh words won't solve problems, action will. Why don't you just switch jobs?"

"Sounds good." Katara said.

"Whatever." Sokka said, same time as his sister.

"You see that?" Aang gloated at me as he grinned. "Settling feuds and making peace, all in a day's work for the Avatar."

"If you say so." I said, not thinking he solved anything. I looked over to see Momo and Appa fighting over a watermelon with Momo constantly trying to fly away with it while Appa pinned it down. I then looked to Aang and pointed to the two Air Nation animals. "Think you can settle that feud?"

"No problem." Aang said, after seeing the feud.

Aang then took the melon and used his airbending to cut it into two. Momo complained on how his half was smaller than Appa's.

"Come on, Momo, that's fair." Aang said as Appa ate his half of the melon. "Appa's got five stomachs."

It was actually true. That was a real fact about air bison. The rest of the world might've forgotten, but we Fire Dragons know how to maintain our history. By the next morning, we continued on and it wasn't long until we made it to our destination, all of us on the edge of it.

"There it is." I said, motioning to the canyon. "The Great Divide."

Everyone was amazed to see the great canyon. Well, except for Yosuke, Tadaaki, and Sokka.

"Wow, I could just stare at it forever." Katara said in awe.

"Oh, I agree." Hiriko said with the same feeling. "It is a marvelous sight."

We stood there for a while until our uninterested trio broke the silence.

"Okay, I've seen enough." Sokka said, walking away.

"Yeah, me too." Tadaaki said, doing the same.

"Same here." Yosuke said, joining them.

"How can you three not be fascinated?" Katara asked, surprised by the trio's reaction.

"Indeed." Hiriko said, feeling the same. "This is the largest canyon in the entire world."

"Then I'm sure we'll be able to see it very clearly from the air while we fly away." Sokka said.

"Actually, we're not flying over the canyon." I told Sokka, shocking him and the others to a stop.

"What?!" Sokka asked as he and the guys turned to the rest of us. "Why not?"

"Because we're going through the canyon." I answered.

"What?!" Yosuke said. "Through that?! Uh-uh! No way! I climbed a mountain for 3 days straight. There is no way I'm going through that canyon."

"We don't have much of a choice." I told him. "We need to get the Fire Nation off our trail and this is the best way to do it. Refugees go through here to get away from the Fire Nation. No soldier would even dare to go near here."

"Probably because it's too dangerous to go through." Tadaaki said. "I heard tons of people went in there and only a few returned. Going in there is a death wish!"

"It's a risk we'll have to take." I said. "Now we need to figure out how to get through there."

"If you're looking for the canyon guide, I was here first!" a man said as he shoved past Sokka.

He was dressed in a white and gold cloak and had his hair like Fire Nation royalty. What he said surprised Katara.

"Ooh, canyon guide?" Katara said. "Sounds informative."

"So there's a guide for this canyon?" I asked the man.

When the man answered me, he was completely oblivious to Sokka mocking him from behind.

"Believe me, he's more than a tour guide, he's an Earthbender and the only way in and out of the canyon is with his help." The man said. "And he's taking _my_ tribe across next."

"Calm down, we know you're next." Tadaaki told the man.

"You wouldn't be so calm if the Fire Nation destroyed _your_ home and forced _you_ to flee!" the man said. "My whole tribe has to walk thousands of mile to the capital city of Ba Sing Se."

"You're a refugee!" I said, realizing what he was.

"Huh, tell me something I don't know." The man said.

"Well, we're kinda refugees ourselves." I told him. "We're heading to the North Pole. Me and my bald friend here are the Avatars."

I then revealed my tail and he saw I was telling the truth.

"Oh, it is an honor to meet you both." He said, bowing to us.

We then looked and saw a large group of poorly dressed people in some kind of brown fur cloths walking toward us.

"Is that your tribe?" Kioko asked the man.

"It most certainly not!" the man answered. "That's the Zhang tribe, a bunch of low-life thieves. They've been the enemies of my tribe for a hundred years." He then whistled and got the group's attention. "Hey, Zhangs! I'm saving a spot for my tribe, so don't even think about stealing it!"

"Where are the rest of the Gan Jin?" asked the woman at the front of the group, who I expected to be the tribe leader. "Still tidying up their camp site?"

"Yes, but they sent me ahead of them to hold a spot." The man answered.

"I didn't know the canyon guide took reservations."

"Ha, of course you didn't! That's the ignorance I'd expect from a _messy_ Zhang. So unorganized and ill-prepared for a journey."

We then watched as we heard protest from the other members of the Zhang tribe. This led to me, Aang, and Katara to look at each other worryingly for this argument seemed like it would escalate. But we then turned around and saw a large pile of rocks float and were somehow tossed away. We looked to where the rocks were and saw an overweight old man wearing Earth Nation clothing. There was no doubt this was the canyon guide judging how he was able to earthbend like that.

"Sorry about the wait, youngsters." The guide said. "Who's ready to cross this here canyon?"

"Uh, one of them, I think." Katara said, pointing to the Zhangs and the scout.

"I was here first, my party's on their way." The scout said as he rushed forward.

"I can't guide people who aren't here." The canyon guide said, causing the scout to fume.

The Zhangs then filed past us and the scout.

"Guess you guys will have to make the trip tomorrow." The Zhang leader said mockingly, making the scout twitch with anger.

When he looked somewhere behind us, he then pointed there in triumph.

"Wait, here they come!" he said as we all looked to see another group coming toward us.

They were all dressed the same as him. Unlike the Zhangs, they were clean and finely dressed. And there was no doubt the elder man leading the group was the leader. By the look of it, the Gan Jin there and the Zhang tribe were opposites in life style.

"You're not seriously gonna cave into these spoiled Gan Jins?" the Zhang leader said to the guide. "I mean we're refugees too! And we've got sick people that need shelter."

That was actually a pretty good reason for the Zhangs to go first.

"I…uh…well…" the guide said, hesitantly.

"We've got old people who are weary from traveling." The scout said to the guide.

That was a good reason for the Gan Jins to go first.

"Sick people get priority over old people." The Zhang leader said to him.

"Maybe you Zhangs wouldn't have so many sick people if you weren't such slobs." The Gan Jin leader said to her.

"If you Gan Jins weren't so clean, you wouldn't live to be so old." She said to him.

We witness to a huge argument between the two tribes and the guide wasn't certain what to do. But I did.

"Well, Aang," I said to him as the tribes argued, "ready to put your peace-making skills to the test?"

"I don't know." Aang said. "A fight over chores is one thing, but these people have been feuding for a hundred years."

"Well, we gotta try." I said. I then stepped forward and got the tribes' attention. "Everyone, listen up! Me and my friend here are the Avatars and, if you can give us a chance, I'm sure we can come up with a compromise that'll be good for all of you."

We then looked to Aang as he was coming up with a suggestion.

"Uh, you could share the Earthbender and travel together?" Aang said.

"Absolutely not!" the Gan Jin leader yelled. "We'd rather be taken by the Fire Nation than travel with those stinking thieves!"

"We wouldn't travel with those pompous fools anyway!" the Zhang leader said and the argument restarted.

I was about to step in, but, to my surprise, Aang brought his voice out.

"All right, here's the deal!" Aang shouted. "You're all going down together and Appa here will fly your sick and elderly across! Does that seem fair?"

With this, both tribe leaders nodded in agreement. It was a good idea. Because neither the sick nor the elderly would seem to be able to cross the canyon, it made sense they would be carried across the canyon while the rest of us meet up with them there. With Appa, we had Seiichi ride with him to the other side.

"Make sure those people get there safe." I said to him as the last of the sick and the elderly boarded Appa.

"Don't worry. These people are in good hands." Seiichi said, assuringly.

"Guys, this feuding tribe stuff is serious business." Sokka said to us. "Are you sure it's a good idea getting involved in this?"

"To tell you the truth, I'm not sure." Aang said, grinning broadly. "But when have I ever been?"

"We're the Avatars, Sokka." I said. "Making peace between people is our job."

"I wish your job didn't make us cross the whole canyon on foot." Yosuke said in dismay.

We were all ready to go into the canyon until the guide spoke to us.

"Okay, now comes the bad news." The guide said as we looked to him. "No food allowed in the canyon, it attracts…" he then made some motions with his hands to illustrate monsters that might've lurked in the canyon. "…dangerous predators."

This brought protest from both tribes. Even I had to agree this didn't seem fair.

"No food?!" the Gan Jin leader said. "This is ridiculous!"

"Oh, you babies can go a day without food. Would you rather be hungry or dead?" the guide said. Before he continued, he rose an earth pillar to tower over us and cupped his hands to amplify his voice. "Now, we're heading down in ten minutes. All food better be in your gut or in the garbage!"

Me and the gang didn't have any food, so we ended up having to watch the tribes eat. The Zhangs quickly whipped out and stuffed their faces with food like they hadn't eaten in days. The Gan Jins, on the other hand, used chopsticks and savored their food. There would be no doubt the Zhangs would be a little slower than the rest of us. After that, we then gave our proper send off to Seiichi and Appa.

"We'll take good care of you 'till your tribes get across." Seiichi said to the people. He then looked to us. "See you guys on the other side! Appa, yip, yip!"

With that, Appa roared as he flew into the sky, going over the canyon to the other side. The rest of us continued on foot through the canyon with the guide creating bridges in the gaps in the path.

"Nice bending!" Aang said, impressed.

"I agree." I said. "That's pretty impressive."

"The job's much more than bending, kids. Folks want information." The guide said as he turned to us. "Many of you are probably wondering how canyons are formed. Experts tell us this canyon was likely carved into the ground by earth spirits who were angry at local farmers for not offering them a proper sacrifice."

We all then looked up in fear as a rockslide was falling toward us, but the guide managed to earthbend a ramp and send the rocks into the canyon.

"He, he, he, guess the spirits are still angry!" the guide laughed. "Hope you all brought sacrifices."

"You're joking, right?" Yosuke said, worriedly. "Please tell me you're joking."

It was a long walk, but we managed to get to the canyon floor and stopped by a huge boulder.

"Okay, everyone, stand clear of the wall." The guide said as he began earthbending the boulder.

He then threw it and destroyed the bridge he made to get us down here, shocking us all.

"Why'd you do that for?" Tadaaki asked, just as shocked as the rest of us.

"You're fleeing from the Fire Nation, aren't you?" the guide answered. "Gotta make sure we can't be followed. We'll be safe now."

Then he yelled as some large animal came in a dust cloud and grabbed him. When Aang and Hiriko blew away the dust, the animal revealed to be a giant insectoid with a crocodile's head, a spider's body, and four ant legs. It was brown with black fur, had eight red eyes, a fork tongue, and a sharp-tooth jaw.

"We gotta help him!" Sokka said as he threw his boomerang at the creature, which made it drop the guide and go after him instead. He ran as it began chasing him. "Okay, now we gotta help me!"

Katara tried to help him with a water whip, but it lead her to be thrown aside in an instant. It was only when Aang shot an air blast at the creature and send it running.

"Nice shot!" I said to him, impressed. "You drove it away."

"Thanks." Aang said to me with a grin.

"What was that?" Tadaaki asked the guide.

"Canyon crawler." The guide said as he laid on the ground. He then groaned in pain before continuing. "And there's sure to be more!"

"Your arms!" Katara said as we all saw how damaged the guide's arms were. "They're broken!"

"Without my arms, I got no bending!" the guide said.

"Tadaaki, you're an Earthbender." Yosuke said to him. "Can you make us another bridge for us to get out?"

"Are you kidding? I don't have that kind of bending." Tadaaki said to Yosuke. "It'll take me days to make a new one. Besides, with those canyon crawlers, I might end up the same as him."

"And there's no way we can fly out of here." I said as everyone turned to me. "With the way that thing sneaked up on us, those beasts will rip us apart before we even reach the top. So, in other words…"

"We're trapped in the canyon." Aang finished me with a face of fear.

We then gathered up together and tried to figure out why the canyon crawler attacked. The only thing we could come up with was that someone brought food into the canyon. Me and the others didn't have any food, so this left to expect one of the tribes had done it.

"I thought the whole point of ditching our food was so we wouldn't have to deal with things like canyon crawlers." Sokka said.

"It's the Zhangs!" the Gan Jin leader said accusingly. "They took food down here even after the canyon guide told them not to."

"What?" the Zhang leader said. "If there's anyone who can't go without food for a day, it's you pampered Gan Jins!"

"I hope you're happy. We're stuck in this canyon with no way out."

"Why don't you thank yourself, food hider?"

"Look, sticking together is the only way to…" Aang said before the tribe leaders interrupted him.

"I'm not walking another step with like of them!" the Zhang leader said.

"Now there's something we can agree on." The Gan Jin leader said.

"Any ideas?" Aang asked as we turned to the guide, who had his left arm in a sling and his right arm bandaged.

"No bending…we need to get out of this canyon…" he said, struck mad by fear. "I won't die here! I won't become part of the food chain!"

"See! We're going to become part of the food chain because of you!" the Gan Jin leader said, pointing to the Zhangs.

"Sure, unjustly blame the Zhangs like you always do!" the Zhang leader said.

The argument was stopped when Aang sent a gust to them.

"Enough!" Aang said, angrily. "I thought we could help you guys get along, but I guess that's not gonna happen." We then watched as he jumped on top a tall rock and pointed to two paths. "We should split up, Gan Jins on this side and Zhangs on this side. We'll travel in two separate lines."

The two leaders nodded at each other and started walking with their tribes following behind, the Gan Jins going right and the Zhangs going left. Me and the gang watched as Aang jumped down to us.

"Okay, here's my plan." Aang whispered to us. "We'll split up and see if we can find out why they hate each other."

"Good idea. Then we can figure out how to end the fight." I said at the same volume. "Sokka, Tadaaki, Yosuke, you go with the Zhangs, Katara, Hiriko, and Kioko, you go with the Gan Jins. Me and Aang will meet you on the other side of the trail. See if you can find the reason for the feud."

They agreed and split up into two teams. Me and Aang would watch from the sidelines. With Sokka's group, they actually found the Zhangs to be like them as they didn't put up tarps ad used them as blankets. With Katara's group, it was the same with the Gan Jin as they set up tents in case it rained. I got this from my team. With me and Aang, we had to share a tent with Momo. The lemur tried to share a bug he caught with us, but we decided to wait till we got out to eat as many leechi nuts as we want. I got this later on, but I'll share them to cut time at the end. This is how the feud started. With this, there are two different points of views. Here's the Gan Jin side. It started a hundred years ago with their tribe's patriarch, Jin Wei, an Earthbender warrior who was assigned an important duty: transporting their sacred orb from the eastern gate to the western gate.

Taking the orb from the east to the west represented the sun's rise and set. It was the tribe's ancient redemption ritual. But, as he approached the gate, Jin Wei was attacked by a Zhang named Wei Jin, who looked at the orb with envy. Wei Jin knocked Jin Wei to the ground and stole their sacred orb. The Gan Jin had never forgotten it and was the reason they never trusted the Zhangs. With the Zhangs, wei Jin was the forefather of their tribe and he was leaving the western gate of their village when he saw a figure in the distance. It was Jin wei of the Gan Jins collapsed in the ground. Wei Jin stopped to help him. Jin Wei told him how he was transporting the sacred orb and how he was transporting the sacred orb and how it was a powerful relic used in the redemption ritual. Wei tried to tend to the Gan Jin's wounds, but Jin insisted the orb was more important and asked him to take it back to the Gan Jin.

Wei promised to send help for Jin as soon as he could. But, as Wei Jin crossed the border to return the orb into Gan Jin territory, he was arrested. Instead of thanking him for returning the orb, they sentenced him to twenty long years in prison. The Zhangs never forgot it and was the reason they hated the Gan Jin.

"Lonely, isn't it?" the guide asked us as he approached us. "Being impartial."

"I wish I could help these people get along, but it just seemed impossible." Aang said to him. "Anyhow, I guess our biggest problem is getting out of here."

"I'm not so sure the two problems are unrelated." The guide said.

I had to agree. If this feud between the tribes didn't get resolved soon, we wouldn't get out of the canyon. The next morning, we all managed to make it to the other side of the paths and were all back together.

"All clear, we're almost to the other side." The guide told us, which was good news.

But things got worse when Aang went to the others.

"Guys, will these people cooperate long enough to get out of the canyon?" Aang asked, but the others looked a little miffed than bearing good news.

"I don't think so, Aang." Katara said to him.

"Yeah, the Zhangs really wronged the Gan Jins." Kioko said, agreeing.

"Indeed." Hiriko said in the same motion. "They ambushed Jin Wei and stole the sacred orb."

"What are you talking about?" Aang asked, confused.

"Yeah, what are you girls talking about?" Tadaaki asked.

"Wei Jin didn't steal the orb." Yosuke said.

"Yeah, he was returning it to their village gate and was wrongfully punished by the Gan Jin." Sokka said.

"Not punished enough if you ask me." Katara said, glaring at Sokka.

"You got that right." Kioko said.

"Here, here." Hiriko said.

This made the guys growl at the girls. It seemed the feud spread to them.

"Okay, okay, I get it!" Aang said to them. "Now we need your help. We need everyone together at the base of the canyon wall."

Me and Aang then went off as the tribes were gathered. After they were, we stood in between them as Aang spoke to them.

"Please, everyone. As soon as we get out of here, we can eat and then go our separate ways, but we need you all to put your heads together and figure out a way up this cliff."

"Maybe the Zhangs can climb the wall with their long, disgusting fingernails." The Gan Jin leader said.

"Oh, sorry." The Zhang leader said to him. "I forgot that, to the Gan Jin, unclipped fingernails is a crime punishable by twenty years in jail!"

"Why, you dirty thief!" the Gan Jin leader said to her.

"You pompous fool!" she said to him.

The tribes then began arguing again with the company of the girls and the guys.

"Guys, focus!" Aang shouted and stopped the argument. "How many times do we have to say it? Harsh words won't solve problems, action will!"

"Perhaps the Avatars are right." The Zhang leader said.

"Yes, perhaps he is." The Gan Jin leader said.

I gave a gentle smile and Aang gave a large grin, but they turned back into frowns when we saw the tribe leaders draw their swords.

"Harsh words will never solve our problems." The Zhang leader said.

"Action will!" The Gan Jin leader said.

Aang yelled in surprise as the leaders clashed their swords.

"To the death!" the Gan Jin leader said. "And let this be the end of this rivalry."

"You know, I take it back." Aang said, nervously. "Harsh words aren't so bad!"

This really got out of hand. The leaders only ignored him as they began the fight. They were evenly matched and I knew this wouldn't end well. It was only when Aang used a strong gust to blow them apart, sending them and the tribes flying backwards. When they landed, we saw their bags open and reveal large amounts of food.

"What the…?" I said, shocked by this. "Is that…food? No wondering the canyon crawler attacked us!"

"Everyone smuggled food down here?" Aang said, just as shocked as I was. "Unbelievable! You guys put our lives in danger because you couldn't go without a snack for a day? You're awful!"

Though his mood changed when he looked between them in wonder. I looked to where he was looking and saw a custard tart in between the piles. Now this was unbelievable. He calms down after seeing one tart.

"So hungry." Aang said as his stomach growled. "Is that an egg custard in that tart?"

"Aang, this is no time to think about food!" I said to him. "We have to get out of here before…huh?"

I then began to hear growling and snarling from behind us. We all turned to see dozens of canyon crawlers approaching. Seeing how we barely survived one, we tried to out run them.

"Oh, no." Kioko said. "That's a lotta canyon crawlers."

"We barely survived one!" Sokka said as he got his boomerang.

"They're coming back for me!" the guide said, panicky. "They're had a taste and they're coming back for me!"

"Sokka, wait!" Katara said as she stopped her brother from going any farther to the crawlers. "I don't care about this stupid feud, I just want us to get out of here alive."

"Me too." Sokka said to her. "I only took their side ʹcause they fed me."

When those crawlers started closing in, me, Aang, and the gang tried to fight them off. It wasn't long until we had them in a pile. Although the crawlers got themselves back up and targeted us. Though me, Aang, Katara, Hiriko, Kioko, Sokka, Tadaaki, Yosuke, and the tribe leaders fought hard to hold them off, we were vastly outnumbered. It seemed like it was the end until me and Aang looked and saw the crawlers going after the food in the bags. That's when I got an idea.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" I asked Aang.

"Oh, yeah." Aang said. He then turned to everyone. "Everybody, watch us and do what we do!"

With that, using some pieces of food, we diverted two crawlers long enough to get on their backs and place bags over their snouts. Our plan was to use the crawlers to get out of the canyon, using the bags to direct them. The tribes worked together and mimic us.

"Now follow us!" Aang said as we tied the bags to sticks and rode the crawlers. "We're riding out of this hole!"

When we got to the top of the canyon, Aang told everyone to get odd the crawlers and we safely landed near the cliff.

"We made it!" the Zhang leader said as she jumped off a crawler.

When everyone was out of the canyon, I took my bag of food and threw it back down to the canyon, just to make sure those crawlers didn't follow us and a way to say thanks to them for helping us.

"I never thought a Gan Jin could get his hands dirty like that." The Zhang leader said, impressed by the Gan Jin leader.

"And I never knew you Zhangs were so reliable in a pinch." The Gan Jin leader said, impressed by the Zhang leader.

"Perhaps we're not so different after all." The Zhang leader said as they smile at each other.

Aang sighed in relief and I was the same for it seemed like the feud was behind them. Turned out it wasn't.

"Too bad we can't rewrite history." The Gan Jin leader said as he drew his sword. "You thieves stole our sacred orb from Jin Wei!"

"You tyrants unjustly imprisoned Wei Jin for twenty long years!" the Zhang leader said as she drew her sword.

I then decided I had enough. I was so enraged that I turned my arms into blades and knocked the swords out of their hands, as they looked at me in shock, their swords jabbed into the ground with the Gan Jin sword next to Katara and the Zhang sword next to Sokka. I turned my arms back to normal and lowered them before I spoke to the leaders.

"Enough!" I yelled as them. "This has gone long enough! We've been trying to get out of the canyon, but we nearly died because of your constant fighting. If both of you would've had just ended your squabble until we got out, we wouldn't have had such difficulty in the first place. Can't you two just try to get along without any conflict?"

Both leaders looked at me seriously when they spoke to me.

"As if we would make peace with these savages for what they did to our honorable Jin Wei." The Gan Jin leader said.

"And we wouldn't even dare work with the ones who imprisoned our innocent Wei Jin." The Zhang leader said.

Aang sighed in frustration before he began giving some thought on the names that were spoke of.

"Wait a second… Wei Jin? Jin Wei?" Aang said. He smiled in realization as he spoke again. "I know those guys!"

"Yes, yes, we're all aware of the story." The Gan Jin leader said.

"No, I mean I really _knew_ them." Aang said. "I might not look it, but I'm a hundred and twelve years old."

"He's actually telling the truth." I said, making the tribes look at us in confusion. "It's a long story." I then looked to Aang just as confused. "But you knew them?"

"Well, not exactly." Aang said. "But Choku did. He told me all about them. Jin Wei was really honorable and would never fail his tribe. And Wei Jin was the most generous and kind man Choku ever met. He once helped Choku when his wing was pinned under a fallen tree."

"So my grandfather knew them." I said, understanding how Aang knew those men and a little surprised by it. "I'm surprised he didn't mention it in his journal." I then turned to the tribe leaders. "Though we know who they are, we still need to figure out exactly how this whole feud started. Which is why I ask of the two tribes to share their sides of the story. Once I know of what you claim to be a blame to each other, I can figure out how I can resolve it."

With this, I then listened as the tribe leaders explained their sides of the story, both with some argument from the other side which I had to stifle. Though I finally knew what they fought about all these centuries.

"So that's all." I said as I stood in front of the tribes. "So the Gan Jins say that Jin Wei was delivering the sacred orb, but was only stopped and had it stolen by Wei Jin and the Zhangs say that Wei Jin was only trying to help Jin Wei by delivering the orb for him and was imprisoned for doing so. I see how you put blames on each other, but here's a thought, have you ever thought of combining those stories?"

This made the tribes look at me with confusion.

"Combine them?" the Zhang leader asked, questioning me.

"What do you mean by that?" the Gan Jin leader asked, doing the same.

"What I mean is that, with every piece of history that has two different sides of it, combining the stories usually reveals the truth, actually shows what happened." I explained. "Now that I know your stories, I've now found what really happened." I then began telling the true tale of the tribes' history. "Like the Gan Jin said, Jin Wei was sent to deliver the sacred orb and would have succeed if it weren't for an accidental run-in with Wei Jin. As the Zhangs said, Wei Jin was leaving the western gate of his village. While Jin headed towards the Gan Jin gate, Wei went on the path to the western gate, where he ended up literally bumping into Jin Wei. This collision left Jin injured, so he couldn't be able to complete his duty. Like the Zhangs said, Wei tried to help him and tend to his wounds. But Jin told him of the importance of his duty of delivering the orb."

"Though Wei refused to leave him there, Jin was able to convince him to deliver the orb in his place, not wanting to fail his village. With this, Wei promised he would do so and come back with help soon after. Wei managed to cross the gate, but was soon met by the tribes' guards. Though Wei tried to explain that he was trying to help Jin, the tribe didn't believe him and accused him of stealing the orb. With this Wei Jin was sentenced to twenty years in prison and Jin Wei was left outside without any treatment. So the tale the Gan Jin were told were only from the tribe and not Jin Wei."

"You're saying we're right?" the Zhang leader asked.

"I didn't say that." I told her. "You see, after being freed from twenty years, Wei had now hatred over the Gan Jin for accusing him of stealing from another man."

"What about Jin Wei?" a Gan Jin tribesman asked.

"He never made it back." I answered. "He was left to struggle in the wild and wasn't able to tell anyone the truth of what happened. Don't get me wrong, Wei Jin was a bit crazy and Jin Wei was a little uptight, that much is true. But they were both great men that respected each other's differences to trust each other. The kind of trust you both seemed to have forgotten. You would know that this was not what Jin and Wei set out for you. Instead of fighting with each other, you should be helping each other. I learned from my ancestors that those with ways that are opposite to each other can help each other and learn ways that benefits both sides. So don't you think it's about time to forget your conflict in the past and forgive each other for your mistakes?"

The tribe leaders looked at each other skeptically, but I was relieved for what they did.

"I suppose it's time we forget the past." The Zhang leader said to the Gan Jin leader.

"And look to the future." The Gan Jin leader said, bowing to her.

I smiled as she bowed back. I turned to Aang as he looked at me happily. We soon reunited with Appa, Seiichi, and the rest of the tribes.

"Good to see you, boy." Aang said to Appa. "Did you miss me?"

Appa replied by licking Aang.

"I cannot thank you enough, Avatar." The Gan Jin leader said as he came over to me.

"It was no trouble at all." I said to him. "It is the Avatar's duty to bring peace and harmony to all."

"Yeah. Well, you know we try." Aang said as he came over and stood next to me, covered in Appa's slobber.

"Ugh!" the Gan Jin leader said, disgusted to see Aang cover in saliva.

We then watched as the tribes got ready to continue their journey.

"Let us travel to the Earth Kingdom capital as one tribe." The Zhang leader said and both tribes cheered.

They then began walking to Ba Sing Se together.

"I'm going too!" the canyon guide said, running off to join them. "I'm sick of this place!"

"That's some luck you knew Jin Wei and Wei Jin." Sokka said to Aang.

"Yeah. Though it was really lucky Roku found out what happened." Aang said.

"Actually, that was one of the two theories I had about it." I said.

"What was the other?" Tadaaki asked.

"That Jin and Wei were the same person." I answered. The group gave me questioning looks. "What? Their names were basically the same, but switched around." I then looked to Aang. "Though it was great that Choku knew them so well. I can't believe he never wrote that. If he did, then it would've been a struck of luck."

"You could call it luck." Aang said. "Or you could call it lying."

We were all shocked by what he said.

"What?!" Sokka said, flabbergasted.

"I made the whole thing up." Aang said with a smile.

"You did not!" Katara said to him in shock. I soon watched as it turned into some kind of devilish admiration. "That is so wrong."

"Let me guess: he only heard of them from rumors, didn't he?" I asked Aang.

"Yep." Aang answered. He then dragged his attention elsewhere. "Now where is that egg custard tart? I'm starving!"

This kid might be a little wild, but he certainly knows how to keep the peace. If it weren't for him, we wouldn't have settled the feud. I bet there will be other surprises as we continue on.


	9. Chapter 8: The Storm

**Chapter 8: The Storm**

It was night and I was keeping an eye out for Fire Nation soldiers. I volunteered to take the first watch for I couldn't much sleep. I was thinking about home, how everyone was doing. Not much for Azula, but for my family and friends, especially Ty Lee. I must make her worry the most. She's one of my closest friends. I always wonder how she's doing and how she was hand-ling all of this. My attention was dragged to Aang when he just woke up gasping, which spooked Momo who was curled up on his head. From there, Momo leapt on Katara's stomach, startling her, then jumped on Sokka and woke him up. I watched as Sokka tiredly and half-heartedly wield his dagger and boomerang.

"What's going on?" Sokka drowsily said as he looked around. "Did we get captured again?"

After everyone woke up, I then went over to calm them down.

"Nothing's wrong." I said to everyone. "Aang just had a nightmare. Go back to sleep."

With this, I heard complaints from the guys as my team went back to sleep.

"Don't have to tell me twice." Sokka said as he went back to sleep.

"Are you all right, Aang?" Katara said with concern.

"I'm okay." Aang said.

He actually looked like he was lost.

"You seem to be having a lot of nightmares lately." Katara said.

"Yeah." I said. "If there's something wrong, you can talk to us."

"I think I just need some rest." Aang said as he closed his eyes.

"You guys want to hear my dream?" Sokka upbeat asked as he sat up, making me and Katara glare at him. "That's okay. I didn't want to talk anyway."

With this, I returned to my post as Sokka and Katara went back to sleep. Though I was still worried about Aang. He had been having frequent nightmares for a while now. Something had definitely been bothering him. I just wish he'd tell me. The next morning, we were getting ready to take off with Aang on Appa's head, Sokka sitting on the saddle, and the rest of us getting our bags packed up.

"Look at those clear skies, buddy!" Aang said as he petted Appa. I looked up to see the weather looked great and saw a flock of birds fly over us. "Should be some smooth flying."

I then looked to Katara checking our food supply. When she turned the bag upside down, I was shocked that there were only crumbs in it, crumbs which Momo instantly ate.

"Well, we better _smoothly_ fly ourselves to the market ʹcause we're out of food." Katara said to Aang.

"Yeah. We're gonna have to restock on rations if we're ever gonna make it to the North Pole." I said.

"Guys, wait." Sokka said in a serious tone. "This was in my dream. We shouldn't go to the market."

"What happened in your dream?" Katara asked as we all looked at him curiously.

"Food _eats_ people!" Sokka said, terrified.

I gave him a grim look as Katara shook her head, the others got on Appa, and Aang readjusted the reins.

"Also, Momo could talk." Sokka said as he pointed at Momo. He then glared at him while crossing his arms, Momo's ears dropped as he spoke. "You said some very unkind things."

"Sokka, that dream makes no sense." I said to him. "There is no way that can happen. Now, come on."

With that, we all got on Appa and left. We went to a merchant's stand in a seaside hamlet built on the side of a cliff face.

"Ahh, it's good." The merchant woman said as she scowled at Katara as she examined a watermelon. "It's perfect, I'm telling you!"

"I don't know if I like the sound of that swishing." Katara said after she shook the water-melon.

The merchant moved around her stand and went over to Katara. Me and the others stood beside them with Sokka filling a basket with fruit.

"Swishing means it's ripe!" the merchant said to her. "It's the ripe juices swishing around, eh?"

"I think it's true, Katara." Aang said as he took a step forward. "Swishing means it's ripe."

"Okay, I know about watermelons and I know that swishing means that melon is rotten." I said as I took the watermelon and put it back on the stand. "Also I just realized we're out of money."

"Awww!" the merchant annoyingly groaned as she took the fruit basket away from Sokka.

We then walked away from the stand as the merchant scowled at us. I turned around as Sokka cried out in pain and realized that merchant kicked him. On the docks, Sokka rubbed his behind as he spoke.

"Out of food and out of money." Sokka said, downcast. "Now what are we supposed to do?"

"We could get jobs." I suggested.

"Where are we gonna find good jobs?" Tadaaki said. "We definitely can't work at that stand and it doesn't seem they have much pay."

"I'm sure we can find a good enough job for us to make some money." I told him. "We just have to look around."

"We shouldn't go out there!" a voice said.

We turned to see a fisherman and his wife behind us. They were speaking pretty loud, so they got our attention.

"Please, the fish can wait." The woman said to the fisherman. "There's going to be a terrible storm."

I then looked at Aang as he seemed alarmed by it.

"You're crazy. It's a nice day." The fisherman told her, gesturing to the sky with both his arms. "No clouds, no winds, no nothing. So quit your nagging, woman."

"Maybe we should find some shelter?" Aang suggested, nervously.

"Are you kidding?" Sokka asked, indicating the fair weather. "Shelter from what?"

"Yeah, it's a pretty nice day." I said.

"My joints say there's going to be a storm!" the woman said. "A bad one."

"Well, it's your joints against my brain." The fisherman said.

"Then hope your brain can find someone else to haul that fish ʹcause I ain't comin'." The woman said.

"Then I'll find a new fish hauler and pay him double what you get!" the fisherman said and Sokka ran up to them. "How do you like that?"

"I'll go." Sokka said as he raised his hand, interrupting them.

"You're hired!" the fisherman sai as he shot a triumphant look at his wife, who scowled back at him.

After a while of looking at him with blank looks, he turned to us.

"What?" Sokka said. "You said get a job…and he's paying double."

"Double?" the fisherman asked as he rounded on Sokka with a wild expression. "Who told you that nonsense?"

When it was time for them to go, we watched as Sokka loaded the supplies on to the ship.

"Sokka, maybe this isn't such a good idea." Aang said as he looked at the sky. "Look at the sky."

"Yeah, I got to agree." I said as I looked to the storm clouds rolling in. "It looks like a storm's on its way."

"I said I was going to do this job." Sokka said. "I can't back out because of some bad weather."

"The Firebender and the boy with the tattoos have some sense." The fisherman's wife said. "You should listen them!"

"Boy with tattoos?" the fisherman said as he turned and looked at Aang. He soon recognized him by the tattoos. "Airbender tattoos. Well, I'll be a hog monkey's uncle. You're the Avatar, ain't ya?"

"That's right." I said as me and Aang smiled. "And I'm the other Avatar."

"Well, don't be smiley about it." The fisherman said coldly, making our smiles vanish. "You sure took your time finding him." He then pointed at Aang. "This Avatar disappeared for a hundred years! You turned your back on the world!"

"Don't yell at him!" Katara said, defending Aang. "Aang would never turn his back on anyone."

"Yeah." I said to the fisherman with a glare. "There's no reason to be nasty."

"Oh, he wouldn't, huh?" the fisherman said. "Then I guess I just have imagined the last hundred years of war and suffering."

I saw Aang's eyes widen, but returned my gaze at the old fisherman.

"Aang is the bravest person I know. He's done nothing but help people and save lives since I met him. It's not his fault he disappeared. Right, Aang?" Katara said. When we looked we saw Aang backing away. "Aang, what's wrong?"

With a look of shock and horrified guilt, Aang opened his glider and flew off at rapid speed.

"Aang, where you going?" I yelled to him in worry. "Come back!"

"That's right!" the fisherman said. "Keep flying!"

"You're a horrible old man!" Katara said to him.

"I can't believe it." Yosuke said in shock. "He's running away again?"

"Again?" Katara asked in confusion.

"Hey, where's Aang?" Sokka said as he got above deck. "Did he leave without saying goodbye?"

"He left because of this guy!" I said, motioning angrily at the fisherman.

"Roku, what did Yosuke mean by running away?" Katara asked.

I looked at her and saw her worried face. I sighed before I spoke.

"Katara," I said to her, "the reason Aang disappeared was because he ran away from the Air Temple."

"What?" Katara said, shocked. "Why would he run away?"

"I don't know." I told her. "But there's no doubt this has to do with his dream. He must feel guilt from it."

"What do we do?" Hiriko asked.

"We need to find him. Come on!" I said as we all got on Appa, who was floating beside the dock. "Appa, yip-yip!"

With that, we flew off and I saw Appa made a big wave that splashed the fisherman and Sokka. We kept flying as it began to raining, trying to find Aang. We managed to find him sitting in a cave.

"I'm sorry for running away." Aang said, quietly.

"It's okay." I said. "That fisherman was way out of line. But we're still worried. That why we need to know. Why'd you run away from the Air Nation?"

"I don't want to talk about it." Aang said in a sad tone.

"Aang, you can't hide from us. We're there for you. We're your friends." Katara said as she place her hand on his shoulder. "Talk to us."

We all then walked over to them.

"Well, it's kind of a long story." Aang said.

Momo then suddenly leapt past us and startled us. We then watched as Appa came over and nuzzled Aang's head with his nose, making the Airbender smile. Aang then patted Appa's chin as we began to smile.

"I'll go get a fire going." I said as I went to get some wood.

After I got a fire going, we all sat around as Aang began to tell his story with Momo lying in his lap.

"I'll never forget the day the monks told me I was the Avatar." Aang told us. "I was playing with some other kids outside the Southern Wall. I was trying to teach them how to do the air scooter."

"Your own personal trick?" I asked.

"Yeah." Aang said, smiling a little. "It was something I came up with." Then his smile faded as he continued. "But then the monks asked me to speak with them. They told me I was the Avatar and knew it for a while."

"How did they know that?" Tadaaki asked.

"They told me it was because of the toys I had when I was little." Aang answered.

"Wait, they thought you were the Avatar because of a few baby toys you picked?" Yosuke asked in confusion.

"They told me the ones I picked once belonged to the past Avatars." Aang answered.

"So, out of many toys to choose from, you chose Avatar relics?" I asked.

"Yeah." Aang answered. "I just chose them because they seemed fun."

"They seemed that way because they brought joy to your past lives when they were young." I said. "You chose them because they seemed familiar."

"That's exactly what the monks told me." Aang said.

I received a little smile to hear how Aang was discovered as the newest Avatar. But then it struck me. Aang was 12 when he got in that iceberg. So the day he ran away was when the monks told him he was the Avatar. Traditionally, people wait until the new Avatar is 16 to tell them they were the Avatar. This way they could have a normal childhood. The monks told him 4 years early. This led me to ask him a question.

"Wait, you're 12." I said to him. "I thought they were supposed to wait until you were 16 to tell you were the Avatar. Why did the monks tell you so early?"

"They told me they did it because they sensed something was about to happen." Aang said. "Something bad. A war."

"Wait, they knew this war was gonna happen?" Tadaaki asked, just as surprised as the rest of us.

"Yes." Aang answered. "And they told me they needed me to prevent it."

He then lowered his head. I suspected that was the guilt crushing him. We all looked at him with concern and sympathy.

"So they called you out for battle in case the war came to past." I said.

"So you were upset you were the Avatar?" Katara asked. "Why wouldn't you be excited about it?"

"Well, I didn't know how to feel about it." Aang answered. "All I knew that. After I found out, everything began changing. The other kids managed to make their own air scooters. They also made a game with them. I wanted to play with them, but, because I was the Avatar, they didn't want me on their team."

"It makes sense." I said. "With the much history of the Avatars, people can become intimidated by them. Even kids find it unfair to have a strong bender like that. Must've been depressing."

"It was." Aang said. He then smiled a little as he continued. "But Monk Gyatso managed to make things fun. After my training, we would play some Pai Sho. Once he switched our pieces around."

"Let me guess." I said to him. "The other monks didn't really approve of this, did they?"

"No, they didn't." Aang said as he chuckled a little. "But he said as long as he took care of me, then I could train and play as much as I would like." We all smiled a bit, but were then depressed when Aang's smile vanished and he stared off into the fire with unseeing eyes. "Then, just when I was feeling better, something worse happened."

"What happened?" I asked.

"One day, I overheard Gyatso talking with the monks." Aang answered. "They told him that what he was doing was wrong and that we shouldn't be together. They decided that I was going to the Eastern Air Temple to complete my training."

We were all feeling pity for him.

"That's awful, Aang." Katara said as she tried to comfort him. "I don't know what to say."

"How could they do that to me?" Aang said as he stood up in anger. "They wanted to take away everything I knew and everyone I loved!"

With that, he temporarily went into the Avatar State and nearly airbended the fire at us, the cinders coming off and heading toward us.

"Whoa! Hot cinders!" Katara said as we dodged the cinders.

Aang then calmed down, came out of the Avatar State, walked to the fire, and sat down.

"I'm sorry I got so mad." Aang said, apologizing for his outburst.

"You have the right to be angry after the monks sent you away like that." Katara said.

"Katara," I said to her, "he didn't run away from the Eastern Temple. He ran away before the monks could even send him there."

"He's right. I did run away from the Southern Air Temple." Aang said. "I was afraid and confused. I didn't know what to do. So…I ran away. I took Appa and we went off into a storm like this. I never saw Gyatso again." Aang then looked at Katara as he finished his story. "Next thing I knew, I was waking up in your arms after you found me in the iceberg."

"So that's why you ran away." I said.

"And then the Fire Nation attacked our temple." Aang said. "My people needed me and I wasn't there to help."

"You don't know what would've…" I said.

"The world need me and I wasn't there to help." Aang said.

"Aang…" Katara said.

"The fisherman was right!" Aang said. "I did turn back on the world!"

"You're being too hard on yourself, even if you did run away." Katara said.

"Katara's right." I said. "If you had stayed, you would've been killed along with the other Airbenders."

"You don't know that." Aang said.

"I know this was meant to be." Katara said. "The world needs you now. You give people hope."

"She's right about that." I said. "You might not be able to see it, but lots of people were given hope because of you. I mean, look at what you've already done. You helped Kyoshi Island, you saved a village from being terrorized by a spirit, and you helped Earthbenders from Tadaaki's village to stand up for themselves. Not many people can do all that. And, with all that, you managed to give them hope for their future. And they're not the only ones. Zuko has hope as well. Sure, he might be hunting us, but you gave him the hope that he can return to normal life. I even have to thank you for all this."

"Why thank me?" Aang asked.

"Because when I found out I was the Avatar, I was the same as you." I answered. "I didn't know exactly what to do. My whole world was turned upside down. Even on our journey, I was beginning to doubt myself, thought I couldn't do it. But, when I found out you were still alive, I now had hope that I could be the Avatar I was meant to be. That we could be able to stop this war. Everyone is counting on us to save this world. Ozai is the one who divided us, you're the one who united us. Now it's time for us to show the world that there is still hope for a bright future."

"Help!" a voice said. We turned to see the fisherman's wife heading into the cave. "Oh, please help!"

"It's okay." I said as I got her near the fire. "You're safe."

"But my husband isn't." she said.

"What do you mean?" I asked. "Where is he?"

"And where's Sokka?" Katara asked.

"They haven't returned!" the old woman said. "They should have been back by now! And this storm is becoming a typhoon! They're caught out at sea!"

That shocked us because nobody could survive that weather.

"I'm going to find them!" Aang said.

"I'm going with you!" Katara said.

"Us too!" I said, speaking for both me and my team.

"I'm staying here." The old woman said as she sat by the fire.

"We'll be back soon." Aang said to her as we were about to leave on Appa. "I promise."

With this, we then took off and headed straight to the sea and into the storm.

"Where are they?" Katara asked as we flew over the water.

"Come on, Appa!" Aang said as we headed for a huge wave.

Aang used his airbending to get us safely through.

"The boat!" Aang said as he spotted the fishing boat. "There!"

When we got there, me and Aang got down to it. When the mast began to fall, Aang waterbended four spouts and split it in half. We then look to Sokka and the fisherman hugging each other. I then turned my hand into a rope and handed it to them.

"Hold on to this!" I said.

Me and Aang then got back on Appa after they do. As we were taking off, I then used my strength to pull Sokka and the fisherman onto the saddle. Though it seemed like we were gonna make it, we then saw a colossal wave behind us. When it crashed, it dragged all of us underwater. Me and Yosuke were the only ones who were awake to see Aang go into the Avatar State. With that, Aang used his airbending to create a sphere around us, getting us all on Appa and got us all to safety at the eye of the storm. When I looked down, I saw Zuko staring at us as we flew up the eye. When we got back to the cave, the fisherman's wife ran up and hugged him.

"Oh, you're alive!" she said before pointing to Aang. "You owe this boy an apology!"

"He doesn't have to apologize." Aang said.

"What if, instead of an apology, I give him a free fish and we call it even?" the fisherman suggested.

"Actually, I don't eat meat." Aang said.

"Fish ain't meat!" the fisherman said.

"Actually, it is." I said.

"Seriously, you're still going to pay me, right?" Sokka asked.

To Sokka's shock, the fisherman paid him with a fish, much to his disappointment.

"Katara, Roku, I think you were right before." Aang said as he came up to us. "I'm done dwelling on the past."

"Really?" Katara said, surprised.

"I can't make guesses about what would have turned if I hadn't run away." Aang said. "I'm here now and I'm going to make the most out of it."

"Glad to hear it." I said. "Bet you won't have any more nightmares from now on."

"And if you weren't here now, well, I guess I wouldn't be either." The fisherman said to Aang. "Thank you for saving my life, Avatar."

With that, I saw Aang smile for the gratitude.

"Hey, do you hear that?" Seiichi said as he looked outside. "It stopped raining."

We all went outside and saw the storm had past and the sky was clearing. Now that Aang was no longer weighed down by his guilt, hope for the future had become as bright as the morning sun. It was a great moment, until Appa shook some rain water off and splashed us.

"Appa!" Aang said as we all stood away from Appa, just a little bit shocked.


	10. Chapter 9: The Blue Spirit

**Chapter 9: The Blue Spirit**

After we went back on our journey to the North Pole, we were forced to make a stop and make camp in a ruin city. Yesterday, Sokka came down with a fever. We let him lie against Appa in a sleeping bag, though it didn't seem that fever was wearing down. He also became delusional.

"This should bring your fever down." Katara said as she pressed a wet rag on Sokka's forehead.

"You know what I love about Appa the most?" Sokka said. "His sense of humor."

"That's nice." Katara said. "I'll tell him."

After Appa growled, Sokka laughed and said "Classic Appa."

"How's Sokka doing?" Aang said as he came over.

"Not so good." Katara said. "Being out in that storm really did a number on him."

Sokka then sniffled pitifully and I then looked to Aang and asked "How did the search go?"

I had sent him, Tadaaki, and Seiichi to look for ginger root. I was gonna make some tea for Sokka.

"We couldn't find any ginger root for the tea." Aang said. "But we did find a map." Aang then showed the map and rolled it out on the floor. "There's an herbalist on top of that mountain." He looked to the mountain range. "We could probably find a cure for Sokka there."

"Aang, Sokka's in no condition to travel." I said.

"Roku is right." Katara said. "He just needs more rest. I'm sure he'll be better." She then started coughing.

"Not you too!" Aang said with worry.

"Relax, it was just a little cough." Katara said. "I'm fi…" she then coughed again, this time with more force, and groaned lightly after so.

"That doesn't sound good." I said.

"Yeah, that's how Sokka started yesterday." Seiichi said. "Now look at him! He thinks he's an Earthbender!"

"Take that, you rock!" Sokka deliriously said as he flailed his arms as if he was hitting something.

"A few more hours and you'll be talking nonsense, too." Aang said. "I'm going to go find some medicine!"

He then got the map and his glider and was ready to take off, but a flash of lightning stopped him. Using a glider in a lightning storm was probably not the best idea.

"Uh, maybe it's safer if I go on foot." Aang said as he put his glider down.

"I'm going too." I said. "Hiriko, you're with us. If anything goes wrong, we'll need your speed to get the medicine down here in time."

"Okay." Hiriko said as she joined us.

"The rest of you, keep an eye on Katara and Sokka until we get back." I said. "Tadaaki, you're in charge."

"Got it." Tadaaki said.

"You keep an eye on them too, guys." Aang said and Appa groaned and Momo chittered in response.

"Ha, ha!" Sokka laughed. "You guys are killing me!"

We then went off to find the herbalist with Aang and Hiriko using their airbending to move as fast as me. We got to some kind of outpost and wrecked it by accident. We found out it was a Fire Nation outpost when a horn blew. Tadaaki told me what happened and he and the others did everything to make sure out two sick Southerners were okay. Yosuke even went off to fill up a water skin for Katara. After we climbed up some steps, we managed to get to the herbal shop.

"Hello, we're sorry to barge in like this, but we need some medicine for our friends, they have fevers and they were coughing…" Aang said rapidly.

"Settle down, young man." The herbalist said, interrupting him. She turned out to be an old woman. "Your friends are going to be fine. I've been up here for over forty years you know, used to be others, but they all left years ago." She then petted a cat that began to purr. "Now it's just me and Miyuki."

"That's nice." I said, confused.

"Wounded Earth Kingdom troops still come by now and again, brave boys, and thanks to my remedies, they always leave in better shape then when they arrive." She said.

"That's nice. Are you almost done?" Aang said, pointing to whatever she was making.

"Hold on, I just need to add one last ingredient." She said as she walked among the shrubbery, looking around and muttering to herself. "Oh, sandalwood? Oh, er, uh, that won't do. Banana leaf? Ah, nope. Uh, ginger root? Uh-uh. Oh, where is that pesky little plant?"

We were all getting tired of waiting for her. I even saw Aang face-palm himself and groaned in exasperation.

"Ah, here's what I was looking for." The herbalist said as she stood in front of a tree with marigold flowers. "Plum blossom." She then plucked a flower from the tree.

"Finally!" Aang said as he lifted his head up from the table.

The herbalist dropped the flower into the mixture and Aang grabbed the bowl.

"Thanks for all your help!" Aang said as he was about to take the bowl, but the herbalist roughly slapped his hands away with a spoon.

"Hands off!" she said.

"Ow!" Aang said as he winced in pain.

"What do you think you're doing?" she said as she held her spoon, ready to attack.

"Taking the cure to our friends." Aang said, rubbing his hand.

She then put the spoon down and laughed, which confused us.

"This isn't the cure!" she said.

"Then what is it?" I asked.

"It's Miyuki's dinner." She answered as she put the bowl on the table and the cat began eating it. "Plum blossom is her favorite."

"What about our friends?" Aang asked.

"Well, all they need are some frozen wood frogs." She answered. "There's plenty down in the valley swamp."

"What are we supposed to do with frozen frogs?" I asked, confused.

"Why, suck on them, of course!" the herbalist said.

This piece of information both shocked and disgusted us, Hiriko the most.

"Suck on them? Ew!" Hiriko said.

"The frog's skin excretes a substance that will cure your friends." The herbalist said. "Be sure to get plenty. Once those little critters thaw out, they're useless!"

"You're insane, aren't you?" I said.

"That's right!" the herbalist said, crazily. "Well, don't stand there all day! Go!"

After she flung some black gunk at Aang, we then ran out as the storm worsened. We stopped after Aang was stopped by two arrows pinning his shoes to the ground. Some more came at us and I airbended them away, shielding us. When I tried to see who was shooting at us, I was shocked to see the one type of archers I knew.

"Yuyan Archers!" I said as the archers took aim at us.

We got Aang and we all ran as arrows were shot at us. This led us off a cliff and into a swamp. While there, I raised up my hand when I felt something on it and found a frozen frog.

"A tree frog!" I said as I held it. I then got a bag out and put the frog in it.

When the archer shot us, Aang waterbended an ice wall to protect us.

"Grab as many frogs as you can!" I told them as I showed them the bag. "We'll carry them in this!"

"Do I have to touch them?" Hiriko asked with disgust.

"Hiriko!" I said to her, glaring.

"Oh, alright." Hiriko groaned as we began grabbing many frogs as we could find.

We managed to get eleven more before Aang got one of his sleeves pinned to a tree. I formed an ice wall in front of him while me and Hiriko helped him get free. More arrows came and hit the ice wall and broke it. Then we all got pinned by arrows and were captured by a net. The next thing we knew, we were taken prisoner to a Fire Nation prison. Hiriko was set to a separate prison cell, while me and Aang shared one with our limbs chained up. We were both unable to move. We both stopped struggling when a door opened and we were met by one certain brown haired man with sideburns.

"So these are the Avatars. Masters of all the elements." He said as he walked over to us.

"Admiral Zhao." I said to him. "So the Fire Lord sent another hunter after us. Just typical."

"So you know who I am." Zhao said as he looked at me. "Though I shouldn't have expected less from the child of Natsuo Tengen."

"How do you know my father's name?" I asked in shock.

"I'm the one who revealed him as the Avatar." Zhao answered, which made me glare at him with anger. "I knew he was hiding something, but I never thought it be his successor being his own son."

It was him who had my father executed, the one responsible for his life being taken by turning him in.

"I swear if we do combat, I'll make you pay for what you've done." I said to him.

"We'll see." Zhao said. He then looked to Aang. "I don't know how you've managed to elude the Fire Nation for a hundred years, but your little game of hide and seek is over."

"I've never hidden from you!" Aang yelled in anger. "Untie me and I'll fight you right now!"

"Uhh, no." Zhao said. "Tell me, how does it feel to be the only Airbender left? Do you miss your people?" Aang then looked down sadly. "Don't worry, you won't be killed lie they were." Aang then glared at him again. "See, if you die, you will be reborn and the Fire Nation would have to start searching all over again." He then looked to me. "Though I think it won't happen to you. Even so, I'll keep you both alive, but just barely."

Then Aang took a deep breath and blew a gale force at Zhao and knocked him into the wall.

"Blow all the wind you want, but your situation is futile." Zhao said as he got up. "There is no escape from this fortress and no one is coming to rescue you."

He then left the room with the doors slamming behind him. Back at camp, it didn't seem like Katara and Sokka were getting better. To make it worse, Yosuke was now sick. Back with us, we tried to break our chains, but it seemed impossible. And we were running out of time as I felt the frogs moving around and out of the bag. That meant they were thawing out. As some hopped out of the bag, we both saw we were running out of time to get the frogs back to the others.

"What? No! Don't leave, frogs!" Aang said to the half thawed frogs as they hopped to the door. "Our friends are sick and they need you! Please go back to being frozen!"

I even heard the guards become confused as the frogs made it under the door. We then heard some clatter and looked to the door. We then watched as we saw Hiriko come through the door.

"Guys!" Hiriko said as she came over and untied us.

"Hiriko, how'd you get out?" I asked.

"He helped me escape." She answered as she pointed to the door.

We looked to see what I couldn't believe I was seeing: another Blue Spirit.

"Who's that?" Aang asked.

"The Blue Spirit." I said. "He's a warrior that helps the innocent."

"So he's on our side?" Aang asked.

"Yep." I said.

We then watched as the Blue Spirit motioned us to follow him. As we did, we saw a guard was tied up on the floor. I then saw the frogs and quickly got them back in the bag. The Blue Spirit then grabbed me and started pulling me. As we tried to find a way out of the fortress, I began to wonder who it was that was helping us. I'm the only Blue Spirit. So that left one question: who was that wearing my mask? The Blue Spirit led us to the wall and we used a rope to climb it. But the alarm was sounded and we were spotted. A soldier got the rope, but me, Aang, and Hiriko used our airbending to break our fall and the Blue Spirit used his swords to do the same. With this, we decided to make a run for it.

"The Avatars have escaped!" Zhao yelled from the balcony. "Close all the gates immediately!"

With that, our way out was blocked by archers.

"Stay close to me!" Aang said as he went passed us.

We did as he said as the gates began to close. Then Aang used an air blast and cleared the path. We made it to the third gate or so I thought. I looked behind me and saw the Blue Spirit fighting off soldiers. He was in trouble, so I decided to help him.

"Aang, take the frogs back to the others." I told Aang as I gave him the bag. "I'll be right back."

"Roku, no." Aang said, worried.

"There's no time to argue." I said. "Just go."

With that, Aang and Hiriko went through the gate before it closed and I went off to save the Blue Spirit. From that moment, I had figured out who it was. Using my airbending, I sent the soldiers away and catapulted us to the top of the wall. We were surrounded, but I airbended the archers away. With that, we made our escape to the courtyards and once er made it to the exit, I then told the Blue Spirit to get on my back and I flew us out of there. We had some arrows shot at us, but we managed to avoid them. We all managed to escape the soldiers. With that, we went to a nearby tree root and were soon met by Aang and Hiriko.

"You made it!" Aang said excitedly.

"It's gonna take more than some archers and soldiers to take me down." I said. I then looked at the Blue Spirit and smiled. "And thanks for your help…Zuko."

Aang and Hiriko were shocked from what I said. Hiriko even gasped.

"Zuko?" Hiriko asked.

The Blue Spirit then removed the mask and revealed himself as Zuko.

"How did you know it was me?" Zuko asked.

"You're wearing my mask." I said to him. "Along with how you helped us out there, it was obvious."

"You're the Blue Spirit?" Hiriko said to me in surprise.

"Yeah. Always was." I said to her. I then looked to Zuko. "I understand why you did this, helping us and making sure no one considered you a traitor, but how'd you get my mask?"

"I found it with your belongings." Zuko said.

"You took my mask?" I said, shocked.

"Yeah. Here." Zuko said as he gave me my mask back. "You can have it back."

"Ain't gonna let anyone steal your one chance in retrieving your honor, huh?" I said to him. "Well, we can't fight right now. Our friends are sick and the only cure is melting away. So I would suggest we leave this fight for another day."

With that, we then began walking back to the ruins. Aang talked with Zuko along the way. It had already reached day.

"You know what the worst part of being over a hundred years ago?" Aang said. "I miss all the friends I used to hang out with. Before the war started, I used to always visit my friend Kuzon. The two of us, we'd get in and out of so much trouble together. He was one of the best friends I ever had and he was from the Fire Nation, just like you, Hiriko, and Roku. If we knew each other then, do you think we could have been friends too?"

"I would think so." I said. When we got halfway to the ruins, we stopped. "This is where we go our separate ways." I turned to look at Zuko and Aang and Hiriko stood beside me. "Hope one day we can put this conflict behind and be friends again."

"It might be strange, but I'm hoping for that as well." He said as he smiled at me.

"Take care of yourself, Zuko." I said as I held out my hand.

"You too." Zuko said as he gripped it.

With that, we broke it and went our separate ways. When we got back, we were greeted by Kioko and Tadaaki. We then watched as Aang went over to our sick Water Tribe members. Yeah, Tadaaki told me Seiichi got sick during the night. Luckily, we still had four frogs left.

"Suck on these. They'll make you feel better." Aang said as he put the frogs in our friends' mouths.

Me and Hiriko sat down in front of them as they sucked on the frogs. Aang sighed before collapsing on Appa's tail.

"How was your trip?" Seiichi asked me as he sucked on the frog. "Did you make any new friends?"

"No." I said with a smile. I looked down at my Blue Spirit mask as I continued. "Just visited an old one."

Tadaaki and Kioko came over as our friends continued to suck on the frogs.

"Mmmm!" Sokka said with a satisfied look on his face. "This is tasty! Mmm!"

"Uh, Roku?" Tadaaki asked. "What exactly are they sucking on?"

"Wood frogs." I answered.

We then looked to the four as they slowly sucked on the frogs in shock. They look at the frogs as they began moving and croaking, showing they thawed out. The guys spit theirs out while Katara's frog hopped out of her mouth when she yelled. They all then began spitting and coughing. Sokka tried to manically rub his tongue against Appa's fur to get the taste off.

"Okay. Why did you made us suck on frogs?" Yosuke said as he and his fellow Waterbenders glared at me.

"Hey, you're not sick now are you?" I said.

With that, I had a good feeling about the future. When this war is over, I hope we can be friends again, Zuko.


	11. Chapter 10: The Fortuneteller

**Chapter 10: The Fortuneteller**

We were at a lake. We had set up our tents and were trying to take a rest for a bit.

"Look!" Katara said excitedly as she pointed over to the water.

We all looked and saw a large se tu. The last time it jumped, it looked at us with a smug.

"He's taunting us!" he said, watching the fish jump in and out of the water. "You are so going to be dinner!"

He then went to the tent, grabbed his fishing pole, and came back to cast a line, but it seemed like his pole didn't even have a line.

"Hey, where's the fishing line?" Sokka said as he examined his pole.

"Oh, I didn't think you would need it, Sokka." Aang said sheepishly as he held up an intricately woven necklace decorated with a red flower.

"Aw, it's all tangled!" Sokka groaned as he saw the necklace.

"Not tangled, woven." Aang said as he got to his feet. He then looked at Katara and smiled. "I made you a necklace, Katara. I thought since you lost the other one…"

"Thanks, Aang." Katara said as she smiled, went over to him, and took the necklace. "I love it."

"Great, Aang. Maybe instead of saving the world, you can go into the jewelry-making business!" Sokka said, sarcastically.

"I don't see why I can't do both." Aang said as Katara tried on the necklace.

While she did, we watched as Sokka tried to catch the fish. He tried to spear it with the pole, but missed.

"Stop taunting me!" Sokka said out of frustration.

He then ran into the water, holding his jawbone dagger.

"So, how do I look?" Katara asked as we all turned to her.

She had her right hand behind her back and her left hand on her necklace as she stood in a pose. It didn't really affect me much, but it sure affected Aang. I looked to him to see him blushing as he pulled his collar with an awkward smile. We looked to him as he spoke.

"You mean all of you or just your neck?" Aang said, nervously. He then put his right hand behind his head in embarrassment. "I mean, because both of you look great."

"Little hot under the collar there, Aang?" I said as me and the guys began to laugh.

"Smoochie, smoochie, someone's in love!" Sokka said as he held the fish and made kissing noises at it.

It then broke out of his grasp, slapped him, and escaped into the water.

"Yeah, and you cut off the middle man with the flower." Tadaaki said as he continued laughing.

"I…well, uh…" Aang said, embarrassed.

"Stop teasing him. Aang's just a good friend." Katara said, annoyed. She then smiled gently and patted the left side of his head. "A sweet, little guy! Like Momo."

She then began petting Momo after he jumped onto Aang's shoulder.

"Thanks." Aang said, discouraged.

We instantly stopped laughing and I was now feeling a little sorry for Aang. Though the guys didn't stop making fun of him.

"Hey, you should take that as a compliment." Yosuke said to him. "Maybe she considers you as a pet!"

The three then started laughing again, making Aang feel embarrassed again.

"Okay, that's enough!" I said, annoyed by them.

They instantly stopped laughing. We all then looked as Sokka came out of the lake, soaked and arms crossed. I then heard something and went out to find out what was making the commotion. I looked to see a man in blue in front of an angry platypus bear.

"Someone's being attacked by a platypus bear." I said, urgently.

We all watched as the man began dodging the platypus bear's attacks. As Aang went to a rock behind the creature, I looked to see the man was smiling like that thing wasn't attacking him.

"Well, hello there!" the man said as he saw Aang, dodging the bear's attack. "Nice day, isn't it?"

"Make noise! He'll run off!" Aang yelled to the man.

"No, play dead! He'll lose interest!" I yelled.

"Whoa, close one!" the man said happily as he dodged the bear's attack again. He even laughed.

"Run downhill, then climb a tree!" Katara said, applying her right hand and gesturing with her left.

"No, punch him in the bill!" Tadaaki said, swinging his fist upward.

"And then run in zig-zags!" Kioko said.

"No need, it's going to be fine!" the man said to us.

The platypus bear attempted another blow, but the calm man dodged it, making it scrape a large chunk of a tree behind him. There was definitely something wrong with this man. I then went over and stood in between them. When it roared at me, I roared back. I managed to scare it off as I watched it swam down a river and leave an egg behind.

"Mmm, lunch!" Sokka joyfully said as he came over and picked up the egg.

The others came over as he sniffed it.

"You're lucky we came along." I said to the man.

"Thanks, but everything was already under control." The man said as he stood up. "Not to worry. Aunt Wu predicted I'd have a safe journey." He then folded his hands together and slightly bowed.

"Aunt who?" Aang asked.

"No, Aunt _Wu_." The man said. "She's the fortuneteller from my village. Awful nice knowing your future."

"Wow, it must be." Katara said as she looked off to the side and pondered on it. She then looked at the man with a bright expression. "That explains why you were so calm!"

"But the fortuneteller was wrong!" Sokka said.

"Yeah." I said, agreeing with him. "You didn't have a safe journey, you were almost killed!"

"But I wasn't. All right, have a good one!" he said cheerfully as he bid us farewell. He began walking away, but gave us something before he left. "Oh, and Aunt Wu said if I met any travelers to give them this."

He then gave Aang a wrapped parcel that looked like to contain something long and thin. That was pretty strange.

"Maybe we should go see Aunt Wu and learn and learn our fortunes." Katara excitedly said as Aang examined the parcel. "It must be fun."

"Don't tell me you believe that stuff." I said to her.

"Yeah. Fortune telling is nonsense!" Sokka said, agreeing with me.

"What do you know? An umbrella!" Aang said as he opened it and held it over his head.

"This is exactly what we're talking about." I said. "Why would we need an umbrella? It's not even raining."

Then in an instant, it started raining. Me and the Waterbenders then made some shields to shelter us from the rain.

"This proves it." Katara said as she ducked under the umbrella.

"This is not proof! It's just a coincidence!" I said.

"Yeah! You can't really tell the future!" Sokka said as he held the egg over his head to shield him from the rain.

"I guess you're not _really_ getting wet then." Katara said to her brother, smugly.

We then watched as Sokka lost his grip on the egg and it flew off into the air. He tried to catch it, but he missed and the egg smashed on his head. As the rain continued, we all traveled on with Tadaaki and Hiriko sheltered under my shield, Kioko sheltered under Seiichi's shield, Aang and Katara sheltered under the umbrella, and Sokka getting soaked in the rain.

"Of course she predicted it was going to rain." Sokka said, crossly. "The sky's been gray all day!"

"Just admit you might be wrong and you can come under the umbrella with us." Katara said to him.

"I can already tell you he'll admit to nothing because fortunetelling is completely ridiculous!" I said to her.

"Says the guy who haves future vision." Tadaaki said.

"Oh, you're on their side?" I said to him.

"You can see into the future?" Katara asked, surprised.

"Yes, but only when it concerns mine and the Element Gang's fate." I answered.

"Then why do you think fortunetelling is ridiculous?" she asked.

"Because it's different." I said. "Future visions have been studied and proven to be useful. Fortunetelling has been proven incorrect multiple times. My visions are accurate, fortune-telling isn't." I then looked to Sokka. "Sokka, help me out here."

"Look, I'm going to predict the future now." Sokka said as we stopped walking and watched as he started hopping from one foot to the other exaggeratedly. "It's going to keep drizzling." The rain continued. "See?"

Then, in an instant, the rain stopped and the sky cleared.

"Not everyone has the gift, Sokka." Aang said as he and Katara looked up at the sky.

"That wasn't the point of it, Aang." I said with a grim look.

We then continued walking with me, Yosuke, and Seiichi getting rid of our shields.

"Agh!" Sokka yelled in disgust as I looked to him to see that Appa shook water onto him.

We made it to the village and I saw a pair of turkey ducks as we went through the entrance. When we got to a building with a round door, a white hair man wearing a black robe told us that Aunt Wu was expecting us. Even though Katara was amazed, me and Sokka were just annoyed by it. When we got in, there were pillows set on the floor, one for each of us to sit on. After we got inside and the man closed the door, a young girl with black hair and brown eyes dressed in a pink robe with a violet dashed, magenta dōura came up to us.

"My name is Meng," the girl said, introducing herself, "and I'm Aunt Wu's assistant."

"A pleasure to meet you, Meng." I said. "My name is Roku. These are my friends: Katara, my cousin Hiriko, Kioko, Sokka, Tadaaki, Seiichi, and Aang."

As she looked at my slumped and bored Airbender friend, Meng's smile widen. I recognized that look in an instant. It was the same look that Aang gave Katara. Looked like Aang had a girl crushing on him, just not the one he wanted.

"Well, hello there." Meng said to Aang with a pleased look on her face.

"Hello." Aang said to her, rubbing his nose in disinterest.

Me, Aang, and Katara took our seats on the left side of the room while the others took the right side.

"Can I get you come tea or some of Aunt Wu's special bean curd puffs?" she offered Aang.

"I'll try a curd puff." Sokka said with a smile.

"Just a second." Meng said as she held her index finger up, not taking her eyes off Aang. "So your name's Aang?"

"Yeah." Aang said, flatly.

"That rhymes with Meng!" Meng said, delightedly. "And you've got some pretty big ears, don't you?"

From there, I got to say she was pretty weird. Who becomes interested in somebody's ears? Aang seemed pretty confused by that.

"I guess." Aang said, awkwardly.

"Don't be modest! They're huge!" Sokka joked, using his hands in dismissal and his arms to emphasis.

Aang covered his ears in embarrassment and glared at Sokka.

"Sokka!" I said as I glared at him.

"What? What I say?" Sokka asked, confused.

"Well, Aang, it was nice to meet you." Meng said as she began to walk away. I then watched as she gave him a sly smile. " _Very_ nice."

"Likewise." Aang said as she then left.

"I can't believe we're in this house of nonsense." I said with a grim look.

"Try to keep an open mind, Roku." Katara said to me. "There are things in this world that just can't be explained. Wouldn't it be nice to have some insight into your future?"

"Okay. One, my future vision takes care of that. Two, fortunetelling has been explained to be inaccurate. And three, I'll keep an open mind on this when the Earth elementals fly."

A while later, Meng came back as a door opened up behind her and a woman in a green robe came out with an excited look on her face.

"Oh, Meng! Aunt Wu says I'm going to meet my true love." The woman said to her. "He's going to give me a rare panda lily."

"That's so romantic!" Meng said. She then looked to Aang flirtatiously and used a dreamy tone. "I wonder if my true love will give me a rare flower."

"Good luck with that." Aang said breezily.

Thanks to my advanced senses, I was able to hear what the woman said as she tried to hold in her laughter.

"Is that the big-eared guy Aunt Wu predicted you marry?" the woman quietly asked, causing Meng to flinch.

That's why she was so interested in Aang. It was because of that fortuneteller. I then watched as Meng then pushed the woman aside and came in with a tray of curd puffs. As she walked over to us, Meng hopefully walked over to Aang, who was thinking to himself and looked somewhere else. She then nearly tripped, saved by Aang, who helped her recover. He didn't even noticed, but he touched Meng's hands and the two stared at each other for a moment. I saw Meng blush as she put the tray on the floor.

"Enjoy your snack!" she said nervously as she left in a hurry.

I thought I was gonna be sick there. Anyone would agree that this was just plain wrong.

"Welcome, young travelers. Which one of you will be first?" an elderly woman in a yellow robe said as we looked to her, no doubt to be Aunt Wu. She then looked at me and smiled. "What about you, young Fire Dragon?"

"How do you know that word?" I asked, surprised she knew that. Many people didn't know that unless they were old allies.

"Oh, I predicted a Fire Dragon would come here." Wu said. "Now, come along. We shall see what fate has in store for you."

"If you're gonna read my palm or something like that, I'll pass." I said.

"Oh, but this will be a method that you'll find you interested in." Wu said as I raised an eyebrow at her. "One that hasn't been done in over a hundred years."

A century old method? Even though I wasn't into this, I would have to see what these nut jobs came up with.

I then sighed and said "Fine. I'll try it."

She then led me to a room with a fire in the middle with a hook above it along with two small cups, a pole, a stone grinder, and some water beside it.

"Okay. What kind of method are you—Ow!" I said as I felt a pinch on my tail. As I rubbed my tail, I looked to Wu and saw she had five of my scales in her hand. I was shocked by this. "What? Did you take some of my scales?"

"Yes, I need them in order to see your future." Wu said as she began walking over toward the fire. "Now come and let us see what it holds."

We both took seat around the fire with Wu sitting opposite to me. She then took one of the cups, placed my scales into it, and began using the grinder on them.

"What are you doing?" I asked, confused by what she was doing with my scales.

"I am grinding your scales." She answered. "It is the only way I can be able to use them to make the tea."

"Tea?" I asked, knowing she was gonna use tea grindings to predict my future. "You're gonna use tea to predict my future? Couldn't you have used tea leaves to do that?"

"This is a very special tea." Wu answered as she stopped grinding. "With both water and fire, the scales can reveal the future."

I then watched as she poured the grindings of my scales into the teapot, the dust shining like stars. She then added the water to it and, after she put the lid on the pot, I saw steam slowly coming out of the spout. She then used the pole to hang the pot on the hook. It was only a few moments later that the steam began bursting out of the spout. She then took the pot off the hook and poured a cup of the tea, which instantly turned into steam. After the steam cleared, I took a look and was shocked that the grindings had changed into five markings: a black tigerdillo, a yellow hawk, a blue wolf, the Fire Nation symbol in pink, and a red yin-yang in the center.

"What happened to my scales?" I asked.

"Your scales have transformed to reveal your fate." She said as she took the cup and examined its contents. "Oh, my! You will be involved in a great battle, an awesome conflict between the forces of good and evil. A battle whose outcome will determine the fate of the world!"

"Yeah, tell me something I don't know."

"I've only told you what the red mark represents." She said. "The wolf tells that loyalty of those around you will be tested, the hawk tells that you will meet great allies on your journey, the tigerdillo tells your strength will be forced to its limits, and the symbol of your nation tells your true love will be one of the Fire Nation."

"You mean a girl?"

"Yes. It will be one closest to you, one you give absolute trust, and haves a joyous life."

I knew who she was talking about. There was only on other person I trusted the most besides my team, the one I trust with the secret of my journey: Ty Lee. I haven't seen her in years. What Wu had showed me gave me a reason to consider it a possibility of a life with Ty Lee. When we came back, I thank Wu for showing me my fortune and returned to my seat.

"Okay. Who's next?" Wu asked as she looked around. "Don't be shy."

Sokka looked away in disinterest while me and Aang looked over to Katara.

"I guess that's me." Katara said as she rose in anticipation.

After the two left, I took it upon myself to try a curd puff.

"Mmm. Not bad." I said.

I smiled as I thought about my fortune. Well, the last part. The guys seemed to notice it.

"What are you smiling about?" Sokka asked as I looked to him.

"Oh, just thinking about my future." I said.

"What was your prediction?" Aang asked.

"Most of it was obvious, but the last part was something I didn't expect: my true love." I answered.

"Really?" Aang asked.

"Yeah. She said I'll marry a girl from the Fire Nation."

"Let me guess," Tadaaki asked, "this girl's name is Ty Lee?"

"Maybe." I said. I then lifted the bowl to Aang to try and change the subject. "Want a puff, Aang?"

"I'm good on puffs." Aang said as I put the bowl down. "So, what do you think they're talking about in there?"

"Not sure. Fortunes are always random." I said to him. "But I guess it might be her love life. Like who's she going to marry, how many kids she'll have. Or something like that."

"Yeah, stuff like that." Aang said as he acted like it was nothing.

I then watched as he tensed up a bit ad began to bite his nails nervously.

"Well, I've got to find a bathroom." Aang said as he got up and walked off into the halls.

I had a suspicion of what he was really doing and went off to find out where he was going. I found him with his ear to the door, no doubt that Wu and Katara were on the other side.

"Aang, what are you doing?" I said quietly, spooking him. "You're know you're not supposed to eavesdrop."

"Come on." Aang said. "I just want to know what Katara's future was."

I then said to him "I know you like her, but this is no way to win her heart."

"Come on, Roku. You found out who you end up with, at least let me see if I can do the same."

With that sad look he gave me, I sighed and said "Fine. But you'll owe me for keeping this a secret."

We then listened in on what was being said. Wu asked if Katara moisturized due to her having smooth palms, but Katara said she used seaweed lotion, which I had to find disgusting. But we both began listening up when Katara asked about her love line.

"I feel a great romance for you." Wu said, somewhat dramatically. "The man you are going to marry."

"Tell me more!" Katara said, eagerly.

"I can see that he's a very powerful bender." Wu said, making me and Aang look at each other with shock.

"Aang, that's definitely you." I said to him, making him smile out of joy.

We then went back and took our seats.

"Looks like someone had a pretty good bathroom break." Sokka said, looking at Aang.

"Yeah, when I was in there…" Aang said.

"I don't want to know!" Sokka disgustedly said, motioning for Aang to stop.

"Who's next?" Wu asked as she came in with Katara.

"Okay, let's get this over with." Sokka said as he stood up and stretched.

"Wait, me next." Yosuke said as he stood up eagerly.

"Your future is full of struggle and anguish. Most of it, self-inflicted." Wu dryly said to Sokka. She then looked to Yosuke. "Same goes for you."

"You didn't even read our palms or anything!" Yosuke protested.

"I didn't need to." Wu said to them in the same tone. "It's written all over your faces."

Both Sokka and Yosuke glared at her in annoyance. It was funny to see that. Those two being rejected by a fortuneteller.

"You there, come with me." Wu said as she looked to Aang.

Aang then got up and followed her. I got to be honest, I got a little curious and listened in on the fortunetelling. Wu told Aang the same thing she told me, that he would be part of an awesome battle between good and evil, but that was the only part she told. When Aang asked about his love life, she said she didn't see it. But then told him that if he followed his heart, he would be with the one he loved. That certainly got his spirit up. After everybody had their fortunes read, we then began our walk out of the building and through the village.

"Well, now you got to see for yourselves how fortunetelling is a big, stupid hoax." Sokka said.

"Yeah, total waste of time." Yosuke said.

"Well, Roku doesn't think so anymore." Katara said. "Did you see that smile he had?"

"Actually, I still think fortunetelling as nonsense, but considering what she told me to be an option." I said.

Katara was a little surprised by that, but recovered and looked to Yosuke.

"Besides, you're just saying that because both you and Sokka are going to make yourselves unhappy your whole lives." Katara said to him.

"That woman is crazy!" Yosuke yelled in anger. "My life will be calm and happy and joyful!"

He then kicked a rock on the ground and it ricocheted off a nearby sign and hit him in the head as he stood smugly with his arms crossed. This caused him to fall to the ground in pain.

"You sure about that?" I said to him. "That fortune seems accurate to me."

"That doesn't prove anything!" Yosuke said as he raised a finger in protest, hunched over on the ground.

"Well, I liked my predictions." Katara said, satisfied before she clasped her hands together anxiously. "Certain things are going to turn out very well."

"They sure are." Aang slyly said as he crossed his arms and leaned on his back toward Katara.

"Why? What did she tell you?" Katara asked him.

"Some stuff." Aang said, ambiguously. "You'll find out."

We got to the village courtyard and we saw some people gathered there and looking up at the sky, which didn't look suspicious at all. We all looked up at the sky as we joined.

"What's with the sky?" Katara asked.

"We are waiting for Aunt Wu to come and read the clouds to predict the fate of the whole village." A man answered.

This was the same man we met earlier. Should've known this was a daily thing.

"Oh, more fortunetelling." I groaned.

"That cloud kind of looks like a fluffy bunny." Aang said as he pointed to a cloud.

"You better hope that's not a bunny!" the calm man said with some worry. "The fluffy bunny cloud forecasts doom and destruction."

"Do you even hear yourself?" Sokka asked in annoyance.

"The cloud reading will tell us if Mt. Makapu will remain dormant for another year or if it will erupt." A woman said.

"We used to have a tradition once a year of going up the mountain to check the volcano ourselves." The man said before he started smiling. "But ever since Aunt Wu moved to the village twenty years ago, we have a tradition of _not_ doing that."

"I can't believe you would trust your lives to that crazy, old hag's superstition!" Yosuke said to the man.

"Uh, Yosuke?" I said to him. "Might want to keep that to yourself. She's coming this way."

We watched as Wu came up a stairwell with the man that showed us through the door, no doubt a guard. Everyone moved out of the way to form an aisle to the pagoda at the center of the courtyard. Everyone cheered as she and her guard went by, all except me, Sokka, and Yosuke.

"Hey, Aang." Meng said as I looked to see her pointing to the sky while standing next to Aang, who was standing next to Katara. "Don't you think that cloud looks like a flower?"

"Huh? Sure, I guess." Aang said in confusion before he pushed Meng into me and looked to Katara. "Hey, Katara, don't you think that cloud looks like a flower?"

"Shhh!" Katara shushed him, making Aang look disappointed.

"Nice try with impressing him." I said to Meng. "But I think you're out of luck there."

"What are you talking about?" she said, nervously. "I wasn't… I was just…"

"I heard your little talk with that panda lily woman." I told her as she looked at me with shock. "I got good ears. There isn't much anything that I can't hear." She then looked down and blushed in embarrassment. I then spoke to her quietly. "Listen, I know Wu told you that, but it's just a suggestion. Some predictions don't happen the way they're supposed to. They get corrected. You might not get Aang, but you'll find love someday. Besides, I think I know somebody who might be a good suitor for you."

I then whispered into her and told her about Yato, a friend of my cousin's who haves big ears himself. She then hugged me and told me, if she didn't get Aang, then she'd wait for Yato. We then looked to Wu as she looked to the sky. She held a book as she did so.

"Bending arrow cloud…" Wu said, thoughtfully. "Good crops this year. Nice big harvest."

"Darn good news!" an old farmer happily said as he hugged an elderly woman.

"Wavy, moon-shaped cloud, let's see." Wu said before she smiled. "Gonna be a great year for twins."

"Yes!" a pair of twin boys said as they high-fived each other happily.

"And a cumulus cloud with a twisted nob coming off the end of it…" Wu said, thoughtfully. She then spread her arms out and said "The village will _not_ be destroyed by the volcano this year!"

Though the crowd cheered, I was not convinced. I then decided to leave the village and do their old tradition, the one they should've kept 20 years ago. While I did that, Hiriko and Tadaaki tried to help Aang win over Katara. Unfortunately Hiriko's fashion advice and Tadaaki's cool guy advice didn't really go so well especially with Sokka's advice for Aang not to act so nice. Back with me, I made it to the mountain peak and got to the rim of the volcano. I looked into it and saw it was full of lava, ready to erupt. I checked it and saw once the volcano blew, it would destroy the village in an instant.

"There! On the rim!" Aang said as I turned to see him and Sokka.

I watched as Aang came over, picked a panda lily, and sniffed it.

"Hey, Roku." Aang said as he saw my worried expression. "What's wrong?"

"That." I said as I pointed to the lava and Aang looked at it in shock.

"Oh, no." Aang said as Sokka came over and gave the same look. "Aunt Wu _was_ wrong."

He then dropped the flower into the lava, where it turned to ash. Both Aang and Sokka looked at this in shock.

"Those people all think they're safe!" Sokka said. "We got to warn them!"

"Yeah, but there's no time to walk!" I said as I got a tail spike out to him. "Grab on!"

Aang whipped out his glider as Sokka grabbed onto my spike. We then took off and Sokka screamed as we did. When we got to the village at rapid flying speed, we saw an irritated Katara standing on front of the door of Aunt Wu's building. After we landed, we walked up to her and the others came over as they saw us.

"Hi, Katara." Aang shyly said as he put up his hand.

"Can you believe she won't let me in?" Katara said, annoyed. "And after all the business I've given her?"

I had to bet that her constantly asking Wu to give her predictions finally made the fortuneteller snap.

"But she doesn't even charge." Aang said, confused by what she said.

"I know, but still…" she said before I interrupted her.

"Never mind that. We have other things to worry about." I said to her and the others.

"What are you talking about?" Tadaaki asked, confused by what I said.

"Aunt Wu was wrong about the volcano." I answered. "I went up there and it's ready to erupt any second."

"Roku, you've tried to convince me she was wrong before." Katara said as she accusingly raised a finger at me, slightly irked. "It's going to take an awful lot to change my mi…"

She was interrupted by a sudden earthquake. After it stopped, we all looked to see the volcano emitting smoke from its peak.

"Now you believe me?" I said to her.

"Oh, no." she said, worriedly.

We tried to warn everyone about the volcano, but they wouldn't listen to us. They asked us many things that science has explained. After many failed attempts to convince them, we stopped.

"They won't listen to us." I said in dismay. "They rely on Wu's predictions so much, they won't listen to reason."

"But they _will_ listen to Aunt Wu." Aang said with a brightened expression.

"Yeah, but she already made her prediction." I said to him. "How are we supposed to get her to warn everyone?"

"By taking fate into our own hands." Aang said as he began to explain a plan of his. "First, I need to borrow Aunt Wu's cloud reading book."

After he explained, I then went into her building while Katara and Sokka made a distraction. It was simple. By using the book, we would make a cloud that would show the danger coming towards them. I was looking through the shelf when I looked to the mirror and saw someone's reflection. After being scared, I turned around to see Meng.

"Oh, Meng." I said to her. "I didn't see you there."

"Aang doesn't like me, does he?" Meng sadly said as her ears drooped down.

"Meng, of course he likes you." I said to her with a gentle smile.

"But not the way I like him." She said, down casted.

"Oh. No." I said. "But that doesn't mean there isn't someone out there who does. Look, it's hard to like someone when they don't feel the same way. That's kind of like how life works. The point is that, even though you don't get the person you love, you shouldn't give up on it. Aang's not giving up on his quest for love and you shouldn't either."

She then smiled and looked aside.

"She is beautiful." She said as I gave her a questioning look. "The Water Tribe girl. I can see why he likes her so much." She then clasped her hands together and counts on her fingers. "She's sweet, she's a bender, and her hair seems so manageable."

With that last part, she tried to smooth her braids just for them to stick up again.

"Don't worry. You're going to meet your true love one day. I know it." I said as I placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"Thanks." She said as I turned to leave. "Wait! Don't you want this?"

I turned around and was surprised she had the book I was looking for.

"How'd you know?" I asked as I took it.

"I've kind of been stalking you and Aang." She said as she nervously played with her fingers and gave me a sheepish smile. "Heh…"

I laughed a little before saying "Thanks anyway."

After getting to the others, we then took Appa up to the clouds as I searched for the symbol of volcanic eruption.

"Clouds are made of water and air, so between the two of us, we ought to be able to bend them into any shape we want." Aang said to Katara.

"Found it." I said as I shown them a symbol of a skull. "The symbol for volcanic doom."

"How ironic." Yosuke said as he saw the symbol.

We then went over to a passing cloud and me and the gang watched as Aang and Katara prepared to shape the cloud in synchronization. I steered Appa as they did so, making it possible to bend the cloud completely. While we did this, Sokka did his part on the ground by bringing Wu to see our new cloud. We got down without being seen and went back to the village to see the new skull-shaped cloud. I went over to the pagoda and began addressing to the villagers.

"We can still save the village if we act fast." I said before gesturing to Sokka, who was standing next me.

"Lava is gonna flow downhill to this spot." Sokka said, motioning with his arms. "If we can dig a deep enough trench, we can channel all the lava away from the village to the river."

"Okay, if any of you are Earthbenders, come with me." Tadaaki said to the crowd.

"I'm an Earthbender!" one of the twins from earlier said, raising his hand cheerfully.

"I'm not!" the other twin said, doing the same.

"Everybody else, grab a shovel!" Sokka said before the volcano erupted again. "Come on! We've gotta hurry!"

With that, we got to work on the trench with Tadaaki and the Earthbenders using earthbending to dig while the rest of us used shovels to do so. And to make sure it wasn't blocked, we had Appa use a net attacked to him to carry out any boulders we found.

"Dig faster! Dig faster!" Sokka said as he resumed working after another eruption with lava beginning to flow out of the volcano.

From there, I saw as the earthbending twin moved some boulders out of the way, creating a channel to the river. We then told the villagers to evacuate and that we would come for them once it was safe. We then watched as the lava flowed to the trench, destroying the village gate and cemetery. The trench worked, but the lava kept coming and was starting to rise.

"It's too much!" I said as me and the gang stood on the safe side of the trench. "It'll overflow!"

Another eruption happened and ash and burning rocks began to rain down on us. Though we ran for safety, Aang just stood there as a rock came down and caused a wave of lava to come toward us. Then Aang pushed the lava back with his airbending and, using the biggest breath of air I've ever seen, he turned all the lava to stone. All of us were amazed to see such powerful airbending, even Hiriko's jaw dropped as Aang relaxed and took a meditation pose.

"Man, sometimes I forget what a powerful bender that kid is." Tadaaki said.

"Wait, what did you say?" Katara asked him.

"Nothing." Tadaaki said, casually. "Just that Aang is one powerful bender."

I knew that Katara had realized that the bender Wu said she would marry was Aang as her eyes widen.

"I suppose he is." Katara said as if she had an epiphany.

After the volcano began to ease, we went back to the village to return the book to Aunt Wu.

"By the way, we kind of borrowed your book." I sheepishly said as I offered her the book.

"So you messed with the clouds, did you?" she asked as she took the book in anger.

Katara looked with guilt and Sokka just smiled and pointed at her, showing she had part of it.

Wu then laughed in amusement and said "Very clever."

"No offense, but I hope this taught everyone a lesson about not relying too much on fortunetelling." Sokka said.

"But Aunt Wu predicted the village wouldn't be destroyed and it wasn't." the calm man said, cheerfully. "She was right after all."

"I hate you." Sokka said as he got near the man's face and gritted his teeth.

"Settle down, Sokka." I said as I pulled him away. I then looked to the crowd. "The reason her prediction came true is because we made it come true. Like many things in this world, we can't leave fate to decide. To make a dream come true, you need to make it happen. It might seem hard, many things are. But, as long as you've got hope and courage, there's nothing you can't do."

I managed to listen in as Aang spoke to Aunt Wu.

"Can I ask you something?" Aang said.

"Of course, honey." Wu said.

"You didn't really see love in my future, did you?" Aang said, disappointedly. "You just told me what I wanted to hear."

"I'll tell you a little secret, young Airbender." Wu said as she gestured to the sky. "Just as you reshaped those clouds, you have the power to shape your own destiny."

Aang then smiled at her kind piece of advice. He then went over to join us on Appa's saddle as Katara spoke to Meng and sat at the reins and waved goodbye.

"Goodbye, everyone! It was nice to meet you!" Katara said brightly. She then turned to Meng. "Take care, Meng."

"Take care!" Meng said, waving to her with a smile.

As we began to leave, I could've sworn that I heard Meng called Katara a floozy. Even though it was proven wrong, I was still gonna keep my fortune about me and Ty Lee as a suggestion, one I was proud to have.


	12. Chapter 11: Bato of the Water Tribe

**Chapter 11: Bato of the Water Tribe**

We were traveling through a forest when Aang plucked a weapon from the ground.

"Hey, look!" Aang said as he examined the weapon. "A sword made out of a whale's tooth."

When me and Sokka got over, I saw it was a scimitar.

"Let me see that." Sokka said as he took the weapon and examined it. He then gave a look of surprise. "This is a Water Tribe weapon." He then looked at us with a serious expression. "See if you can find anything else."

We then began searching around for more weapons. It was when the rest of the group showed up.

"Did someone lose something?" Katara asked, curiously.

"No, we found something!" Aang cheerfully answered as he rummaged through the bushes.

I then found something covered in leaves. Removing the debris, I found an arrowhead and picked it up.

"Hey, I found an arrow!" I said as the others gathered. I examined it and rubbed off some ash on it. "It's burned."

"There was a battle!" Sokka said as we looked to a tree that had scorch marks and cuts running across the bark. "Water Tribe warriors ambushed a group of Firebenders."

I looked to the ground and saw scorch marks on the grass.

"The Firebenders seemed to have fought back." I said as we looked to the marks.

"But the warriors drove them down this hill." Sokka said as he then ran down the hill.

We followed him to a sandy beach after going on a dirt path and over rocks.

"So, then what happened?" Aang asked, intrigued by this.

"Don't know." I said, confused as Sokka looks with disappointment. "Trail ends here."

"Wait, look!" Katara said as she pointed to something.

We all looked to a brown wooden ship with blue sail behind large rocks, sitting idly on the shore.

"It's one of our boats!" Sokka said, happily.

"Is this dad's boat?" Katara asked as she and her brother ran up to it.

"No, but it's from his fleet." Sokka answered as he stroked the boat and the rest of appeared behind him. "Dad was here." He then turned to Katara.

When night fell, we decided to make camp next to the ship.

"So, how long do you think it's been since someone was here?" Katara asked.

Sokka stood by the ship while the rest of us huddled around the fire.

"Long enough for moss to grow on the hull." Sokka said as he inspected the boat. He then looked to Katara unsurely. "About three months."

"Oh." Katara said, disappointedly. She then looked down sadly. "So Dad's probably gone."

"I wonder why they left this boat?" Sokka said. "There's nothing wrong with it."

"When was the last time you saw your dad?" Aang asked.

"I don't want to talk about it." Sokka said as he turned away.

"Sorry." Aang said as he looked down in guilt. "I didn't mean to bring that up."

"It's okay, Aang." Katara said to him. "Our dad left about two years ago with all the other Water Tribe men."

"Maybe we should all get some sleep." Sokka said as he laid around the fire and pulled a blanket over himself, interrupting Katara. It seemed like a sensitive subject so I didn't push any farther and we all went to sleep with Aang resting on Appa's left front leg.

I looked to see that Sokka woke up and was fiddling with the fire with a serious look on his face. I could tell that he really missed his father. That look he was giving was the same one I gave when anyone mentioned my father when I was a child. I then heard some rustling and both me and Sokka stood up and looked to the forest.

"Who's there?" Sokka said as he got out his boomerang.

We then watched as a man with white bandages around his torso with his shirt covering it. He had long, brown hair and royal blue eyes. By the looks of him, he was from the Water Tribe.

"Sokka?" the man said as he looked at us with surprise.

"Bato?" Sokka asked with an eyebrow raised in surprise.

"Who?" I said as Sokka smiled at him spiritedly.

"Who the what now?" Aang said as he and the others woke up.

"Bato!" Katara cheerfully said as she saw the man.

Me and the gang followed Sokka and Katara as they ran up to the man, but stood a few feet away.

"Sokka! Katara! It is so good to see you two." The man said as he hugged Katara and Sokka. "You've grown so much!"

"Uh, hello there, sir." I said as I bowed to him. "My name is Roku."

"Where's Dad?" Sokka asked the man.

"Is he here?" Katara asked.

"No, he and the other warriors should be in the Eastern Earth Kingdom by now." The man said. This caused Katara and Sokka to give crestfallen looks. A gust came and gave all of us a chill. "This is no place for a reunion. Let's get inside."

He then turned around and slung his arms around Katara and Sokka as he led them away. After a moment, he then looked and motioned us to follow. We all followed him to the courtyard of an abbey as he explained what happened.

"After I was wounded, your father carried me to this abbey. The sisters have cared for me ever since." Bato said to Sokka and Katara. When he spoke again, a woman turned around to face us. "Superior, these are Hakoda's children. They've been traveling with friends and the Avatars. I found them by my boat."

"Young Avatars, it give me great joy to be in your presence." The woman said as she shortly bowed to me and Aang with a gentle smile. "Welcome to our abbey."

"Thank you, it's truly an honor to be here. If there's anything…" I said before Sokka interrupted me.

"What smells so good, Bato?" Sokka asked.

I sniffed the air and smelled something good as well.

"The sisters craft ointments and perfumes." Bato answered.

"Perfume? Maybe we can dump some on Appa." Sokka said as he motioned to Appa and waved his hand like he was removing a stench from his vision. "Because he stinks so much." He then put out his arms and gave a smug, showing he was making one of his jokes. "Am I right?"

Nobody laughed at that. Yeah, Sokka's jokes always fell flat. I could've sworn I heard someone cough from the silence.

"You have your father's wit." Bato said with a dull look on his face.

Bato led us to the hut he was staying in. there was a tent on the opposite side of the room, a fire with cousins in the middle, and animal pelts placed and hung everywhere.

"Bato, it looks like home!" Katara said happily as we went inside.

"Everything's here, even the pelts!" Sokka said as he kneeled down and felt a pelt.

"Yeah, nothing's cozier than dead animal skins." Aang said, sarcastically.

I had to bet this kinda made him uncomfortable. I watched as Momo scurried over and messed with the head of a bear pelt. When its mouth closed, he scurried back to Aang in fright. As Katara and Sokka sat around the fire, Katara opened the lid of the pot cooking over the fire as Bato joined them.

"No way! Stewed sea prunes?" Katara said in surprise and delight.

"Help yourself!" Bato said.

"Dad could eat a whole barrel of these things." Sokka said as his sister prepared some bowls of the stew.

I slurped some of the stew, but instantly spat it back into the bowl.

"Ugh! That's the worst thing I've ever tasted!" I said before Bato began to laugh.

"You're definitely Natsuo's boy alright." Bato said to me as I looked at him in surprise. "He hated sea prunes too."

"You knew my father?" I asked him.

"Oh, yeah." Bato answered. "He and Hakoda would cause all kinds of trouble."

"Wait, Dad was friends with him?" Sokka said, shocked by this.

"Yeah. Natsuo would visit the South Pole with his mother." Bato said.

"Grandma Lila?" I asked. "Why would she bring him there?"

"Because she was from there." Bato answered, shocking me.

"My grandmother was from the Southern Water Tribe?" I said.

"Yes. Even though she lived in the Fire Nation with Daniel, she still came back to the tribe." Bato said. "Natsuo helped with much we did."

"You mean like when you and Dad lassoed an artic hippo?" Sokka asked.

"Artic hippo?" I asked.

"It was Hakoda's idea, those two just dragged me into it." Bato said. "Well, the hippo did the dragging!"

"Mom always told me Dad was always looking for danger." I said. "We've had our share of riding animals. Seiichi rode some elephant koi, Aang rode a unagi, and we all rode some canyon crawlers."

"Yeah. The only one who came up with as much crazy ideas as Hakoda was your father." Bato said.

"So, who was it that came up with the Great Blubber Fiasco?" Sokka asked.

"You know about that?" Bato said as he chuckled to himself.

"Everyone does!" Katara said.

"What's that story?" Aang curiously asked.

"It's a long one, Aang, some other time." Sokka said to him.

"I bet you and our fathers had some hilarious adventures." I said to Bato.

"Not all of which were hilarious at the time, but everything's funny in hindsight." Bato chuckled.

As we heard laughing, we turned to see Aang walking around with a fur pelt on his head. I chuckled a bit. It was pretty funny.

"Hey, Aang! Please put that down." Bato said, making Aang stop. "It's ceremonial and very fragile."

Aang then put it back on the wall and went to sit at the back of the room.

"Aang, why are you sitting over there for?" I said to him. "Come on, you need to hear this."

Aang then came over as we talked to Bato.

"Was it you or Dad that put on an octopus on your head and convinced Gran-Gran you were a water spirit?" Sokka asked.

"Natsuo helped with that. Hakoda wore the octopus," Bato said before he lowered his voice, "but I did the spooky voice."

The night continued with tales of all kinds of hilariously daring feats and pranks.

"There's some I should tell you kids." He said to Katara and Sokka. "I'm expecting a message from your father."

That surprised us all, bringing excitement to Katara and Sokka.

"Really?" Katara asked.

"When?" Sokka asked.

"Any day now." Bato said. "Your father said he'd send a message when they found the rendezvous point. If you wait here until the message arrives, you can come with me and see your father again."

"It's been over two years since we've seen Dad." Sokka said. "That would be so incredible! Katara?"

"I do really miss him." Katara said. "It would be great to see Dad."

"It's been far too long, hasn't it?" Bato said. "I'm not sure when word will arrive, but, when it does, we'll go."

"It would be great, but we can't." Sokka said with a depressed look. "We have to take Roku and Aang to the North Pole first."

"Even if we do have time to wait for the message, who knows how far we'd have to travel." Katara said with the same look. "We don't have time for a long detour."

"I'm sure your father would understand," Bato said to them, "and be proud that his children are helping the Avatars."

"Duty comes first." I said. "I promise that once we've master all the elements, we'll go find your father."

"Thanks, Roku." Katara said to me.

Sometime later, I managed to sneak over to the beach. The reason I did so was so I could have a moment to myself. That talk with Bato really got me to realize me and my friends don't really have that much time together. It's not really joyful if you're not gonna see most of your friends for a while. Sitting on the deck of Bato's ship, I looked to the stars, alone in my thoughts. I soon realized I wasn't alone when Momo landed on my head, where I knew who just showed up.

"Roku," Aang said as I turned to him, "what are you doing out here?"

"Oh, Aang." I said. I then sighed before I spoke again. "Just thinking to myself."

"What are you thinking about?" Aang asked as he sat next to me.

"Well…about our journey." I said. "Talking to Bato made me realized that it's almost over. I'm only halfway to mastering all four elements and I'm already starting to miss the moments we shared together. I mean, I'll be glad to get back home, but I can't imagine life without you guys, our group being divided with me and Kioko back in the Fire Nation, you and Hiriko at the Air Temples, Tadaaki back at his village, Seiichi and Yosuke at the North Pole, and Katara and Sokka back at the South Pole. I'll really miss you guys. Not Yosuke that much, but still. Very much, you guys have become more than my friends. You're my family."

I gave a look of depression as I looked down. I looked up after Aang put a hand on my shoulder.

"Hey, don't worry about it." Aang said to me. "Sure, we won't be able to hang out for a while, but that doesn't mean we won't see each other again. We're best friends and nothing will change it."

With that, I saw he was right and, even though we'll be distant for a while, we'll see each other again.

"You're right." I said as I smiled at him. "Thanks, Aang."

"No problem." Aang said as he grinned at me."

We heard something and looked to the stern to see an ostrich horse coming over with an Earth Nation soldier riding it. We got off the ship as he came over to us.

"I'm looking for Bato of the Water Tribe." The soldier said to us.

"We know Bato." I told him. "Are you the messenger?"

"Yes. Make sure he gets this!" the soldier said as he gave me a scroll and rode off.

I then unraveled it and me and Aang saw it was a map.

"It's the map to Sokka and Katara's dad!" Aang said, surprised to see it.

"Now we know where to meet him." I said as I rolled up the map. "Okay. Let's get this to Bato."

We then went back to the abbey, where I then showed the map to the others. This brought excitement from both Sokka and Katara for they knew where their dad was. I got some thanks from them after I told them I would make a duplicate map so, once me and Aang had mastered all four elements in time, we could be able to meet with them there. The next day, while Aang, Sokka, and Katara went off with Bato to check on his ship, I got to work on duplicating the map. While I did so, the others kept guard in case Zuko was around. Though Yosuke was becoming impatient with me.

"Oh, come on!" Yosuke yelled, nearly startling me. "Can't you go any faster?"

"Don't rush me, Yosuke." I told him as I looked up at him. "This line of work is very delicate. Even one mistake could ruin the parchment. I have to be careful, get every detail right. Which means no distractions, especially your complaints."

He turned his back to me and growled as I went back to work. Took me a while, but I finished it. Now we just had to wait for the ink to dry. If anything touched it, the ink would rub off. After I placed supports to keep the scroll flat, I went over to greet the trio as I heard them coming back. When I got a look at them, I saw they all had marks on their foreheads. Sokka's mark was an arc with a small got underneath, Katara's mark was a crescent moon, and Aang's was just an arc.

"Uh, what are those marks on your heads?" I asked.

"I read about this once. Those are the marks of honor." Seiichi said. "They are given to the Southern children after completing some ritual. Sokka haves the Mark of the Wise, given for handy decision-making and being a strong leader. Katara haves the Mark of the Brave, given for acts of great courage. And Aang, he haves the Mark of the Trusted, given to those who has earned the Water Tribes' trust."

"Yep. I'm an honorary member of the Water Tribe." Aang said with a proud grin.

"How's the map coming along?" Sokka asked as I looked to him.

"Just finished it." I told him. "Now we just have to wait for it to dry."

I then looked around to see that only four members of my team were accounted for. I wasn't the only one who noticed.

"Wait, where are Hiriko and Tadaaki?" Aang asked confused.

"Yeah, they should've been back now." I said.

We then went out to find them. We found them in the forest, lying on the ground with looks of shock. I was a bit confused until I looked to see Zuko, Iroh, some black haired woman wearing a black dress and boots with a whip, two red spiral tattoos on her arms, and her hair covering right eye, and a shirshu. The shirshu was what I was afraid of. That large, star-nosed, mole-like creature without any eyes is a born tracker and hunter. It can track down a scent from miles away.

"Now, I'm asking you for the last time," Zuko said as he looked at the two. "Where are the Avatars?"

"Go…jump off…a cliff." Tadaaki said, strained.

"Zuko?" Seiichi quietly asked in confusion as we hid. "How did he find us?"

"With that." I quietly said as I pointed to the beast. "That's a shirshu. I read that once one haves you're sent, it'll never stop hunting you."

"What are we supposed to do now?" Zuko asked the girl.

"It's seeking a different scent." The girl said as the shirshu walked over to Tadaaki. "Perhaps something that the Avatars held."

I then watched as the beast knocked Tadaaki into a tree and began sniffing the ground. I looked a little closer and saw some of my scales were on the ground. I then told everyone to head back to the abbey as that thing got my scent. From there, we then went into hiding with me flying over the abbey. We were gonna ambush them. I then watched as the shirshu came bursting through the gates with the girl, my teammates, Zuko, and Iroh on its back. Because I was flying in circles over the abbey, the shirshu just began walking in circles.

"What's it doing?" Zuko said as the shirshu followed my scent. "It's just going in a circle."

When the shirshu stopped and looked up, I was already swooping down towards it. It tried to hit me with its tongue, but I flew over it, causing it to go on its hind legs, knocking its riders off, and fall back to the ground. After that, the others came out and got Tadaaki and Hiriko out of there. The rest of the group fought Zuko, while I would handle the shirshu.

"Up!" the girl said as she cracked her whip at the beast.

The beast got up and the girl mounted on it. It charged at me, but was knocked down when Appa came in and knocked it into the wall, knocking both the rider and the beast unconscious. I then went over and searched to see what they used to track us. I couldn't find anything except my scales. No doubt she would try to track me to make some cash with the Fire Nation. I then stowed them away in my pocket. I then went to check on the girl, to see if she was still alive. I managed to turn around in time to se Aang's airbending and Zuko's firebending clash, creating a large explosion that formed a mushroom cloud. The force of the explosion launched them to two separate roofs. I turned around to see the girl get up.

"Come on! Get up!" she said as she cracked her whip.

When the shirshu got up, I decided to get some distance. As it began to chase me with the girl riding it, I managed to get to Appa and rode him as we got ready to attack. While getting over to the other side, Appa ended up being lashed by the shirshu. I found that out after Appa landed and fell down, paralyzed. This was a fact I left out. The shirshu's tongue holds a poison that paralyzes its prey. That's why I dodged it, so I wouldn't get paralyzed.

"Appa, get up!" I said to him as the girl and the shirshu waited there.

I then watched as Appa opened his eyes and got up. The toxin might've weakened him, but Appa was still in the fight. With a crack of the whip, the shirshu charged toward us and we did the same. Though that girl made a mistake charging at us, she definitely found that out when the force from the collision knocked her off. She tried to whip Appa, but that just ticked him off. Found that out when he tried to crush her while she was lying on the ground.

"That was a mistake there, lady." I said as we looked at her.

I then used my powers to trap her in a wrap and was able to look to see Zuko firebend into a well. A spout came out and knocked him to the ground behind it. On the other side of the well, I saw Aang land completely dry. Had to bet Aang caused that spout. I don't know how, but the girl got out of my wrap and got back on her shirshu. I then got back on Appa to get ready to fight. We managed to block Zuko as he tried to chase Aang, but Appa got lashed again by that shirshu. I then watched as he collapsed from the lashings. I then ran off as that shirshu cornered me to a wall. Aang was cornered to the same wall by Zuko. We were trapped between blasts of flames and a whipping tongue. It seemed like it was over until I saw Sokka and the sisters pour four large pots of perfume onto the ground and Katara waterbended it all over the place.

When the shirshu started looking around frantically, I saw what they did. With all those different scents, the beast couldn't figure out where it was going. It was blind sighted. We watched as it then paralyzed Zuko and paralyzed the girl.

"June! No!" Iroh said as he got her in his arms.

The shirshu ran like crazy, knocking over more perfume before going over the wall and ran off into the forest. I and the guys regrouped for our victory. I looked to Zuko and Iroh lying on the ground with the girl, who was name apparently was June, cradled in his right arm. I was able to hear what they were saying.

"Uncle?" Zuko said, weakly. "I didn't see toy get hit with the tongue."

"Shhh." Iroh shushed him before going back into position with a smile.

I got to say, I never took him for such a sly dog. Bet June wasn't happy about that. Later that day, after getting packed up on Appa, we all said our goodbyes and took off.

"Well, that was a long day." Tadaaki said, tired.

"At least we can meet up with Bato once we're done with this." Yosuke said.

"About that…" I said as I got out the ruined parchment. "When you guys splattered perfume all over, some it soaked the map I made. I told Bato I would message him to give us a new rendezvous point as soon as possible. I hope you guys aren't made about this."

"It's okay, Roku." Katara said. "We can worry about that later. We need to get you and Aang to the North Pole.

"Yeah, we've lost too much time as it is." Sokka said.

"Don't you want to see your father?" Aang asked the siblings as he turned to us.

"Of course we do." Sokka said to him. "But you guys are our family too. And, right now, you need us more."

"And we need you." Katara said to Aang.

"I wish I could give you a little piece of home, Katara." Aang said to her. "Something to remind you…"

"I'll be okay." She said.

"Still, just a little trinket. Maybe something like…this?" Aang said as he held up a necklace to her.

It was a blue choker with a light blue, hand-crafted jewel with the Water Tribe symbol on it.

"Aang, how'd you get that?" Katara asked as she took the necklace and put it on with a smile.

"Zuko asked me to make sure I got it to you." Aang said with a smug as Sokka rubbed his eyes in shock.

"Aw, that's so sweet of Zuko." Katara sarcastically said before talking normally. "Could you give him a kiss for me when you see him?"

"Sure." Aang said.

I then watched as Katara leaned in and kissed Aang on the cheek, causing him to smile with a blush. He twiddled his fingers as we continued on our journey. Things didn't work out as planned, but at least some good things happened. At least I know, no matter what, we'd have each other's backs as both a team and a family.


	13. Chapter 12: The Deserter

**Chapter 12: The Deserter**

There we were, in a forest trying to find a place to rest and restock on supplies. While walking through those trees, I couldn't help but get the feeling we were being watched. I looked around and saw nothing but trees. I chose to ignore it and went off to rejoin the others around a roadside kiosk in the middle of the crossroad.

"This should give us a good idea of what's around here." Katara said as she walked up to a poster on the kiosk.

As she said it, Sokka flipped our provisions bag and found it empty besides a few crumbs.

"See if you can find a menu, I'm starving!" Sokka said as he wiped his mouth.

"I bet we'll find something to eat here," Aang said as he pointed at the poster, the Fire Days Festival."

"Fire Days Festival?" I asked as I came over to him in surprise along with the girls. "That's today?"

"You know it?" Aang asked.

"Of course." I said. "Me and the girls used to love going to them as kids. It's got amazing food, amazing events, like magic acts, dragon dancing, juggling, and firework shows. Firebenders from all around go there."

"That sounds like it would be a great place for me to study some real Firebenders." Aang said.

"You might wanna rethink that." Sokka seriously said as we joined him on the other side and saw some other posters. "Look at this."

"Hey, a poster of me!" Aang said as he saw one with him on it.

"There's one of me!" Tadaaki said, looking at a poster of him.

"And me!" Yosuke said, looking at a poster of him.

I looked to see there were posters of me, my team, and Aang. I pulled mine down and saw it had a bounty.

"They're wanted posters!" I said as Aang pulled his down and read it. "Not good."

"I think we better keeping moving." Katara said as she stared at the poster.

"I have to learn firebending at some point and this could be my only chance to watch a master's up close." Aang said.

"I guess we could go check it out." Katara said with her head bowed, making Aang smile.

"What?" Sokka opposed as he walked over to Katara. "You wanna walk into a Fire Nation town where they're all filled-up with their…you know, fire?"

"We'll wear disguises and, if it looks like trouble, we'll leave." Katara said as she walked over to Appa with Aang following behind.

"Yeah." Sokka said, sarcastically. "Because we always leave before we get into trouble."

When we got to a cliff near the village, Aang turned to face Appa and Momo, who followed us there.

"You guys tay out of sight here while we go to the festival." Aang said to them.

Momo then hid in a bush and Appa hid behind it.

"Ready disguises!" Aang said to Katara and Sokka.

I then watched as Katara and Sokka put on black cloaks while Aang pulled his shawl over his head, smiling as he looked at us. He looked ridiculous.

"It's like you're a whole different person." Sokka sarcastically said about Aang's disguise as Katara giggled.

"Seriously? These are your disguises?" I said to them. "You'll never fit in like that!"

"What do you mean?" Katara asked.

"You need to wear a traditional festival mask to get in." I answered. "Come on, let's see if there's a mask shop."

When we got there, it was night and the festival was in full swing. I even saw a group of dragon dancers go by us. We looked around to see if we could find a mask shop.

"Get you genuine Fire Festival masks here!" a man said as we all looked and saw a stand full of masks.

We went over and got our masks. I got a red mask with a yin-yang symbol, Seiichi got an usobuki, Yosuke got a kawazu, Tadaaki got a kojo, Hiriko and Kioko got matching, reverse, split color masks, Katara got a blushed woman's mask, Sokka got a blue smiling mask with a mane around its rim, and Aang got a red mask with a frown on it. I watched as Katara switched their masks, revealing as Sokka frowning and Aang smiling. I had to bet Sokka was a bit annoyed by that. We then started heading deeper into the festival in search for essentials.

"Hey, there's some food." Aang said as he pointed to a shop.

"Finally." Sokka said as he then went over and spoke to the shop keeper. "What do you have?"

"Flaming fire flakes." The shop keeper said, presenting a bag to Sokka. "Best in town."

"I'll take 'em!" Sokka said as he took the bag.

"Fire flakes?" I said as I realized what Sokka was about to eat. "Sokka, wait!"

I was too late for Sokka started gobbling down the fire flakes.

"Aaahhh! Hot! Hot!" Sokka yelled as he spazzed from the spiciness.

"I tried to warn you." I said to him. "Fire flakes are really spicy."

"Now you tell me." Sokka said with a displeased look.

"I'll take 8 bags of fire flakes." I said to the shop keeper.

"Here you go." The shop keeper said as he gave me the bags.

Sokka was shocked when he saw me eat the flakes with having the same reaction. He then looked to Hiriko for an answer, which she did give.

"Roku likes fire flakes." She told him.

"Hey, look at this." Aang said as we all looked to a puppet stage with rows of children in front of it.

This was entertainment for the little, showing how "great" the Fire Lord is.

"Don't worry, loyal citizens!" the Fire Lord puppet said. "No one can surprise the Fire Lord!"

The kids tried to warn him as an Earth Nation general puppet appeared, ready to attack with a rock. They cheered after the Fire Lord puppet blew fire at the other puppet, burning it. That actually shocked me and the group, so we decided to go somewhere else. We then started following Aang as he headed for a large crowd.

"Aang, hold on!" Katara said to him as we head to the crowd. "Where are we going?"

"I don't know." Aang said to her. "But there's a big crowd, so it must be good."

"Knowing the Fire Nation, it's probably an execution." Sokka sarcastically said.

"Sokka, not everything in the Fire Nation is about death." I told him.

We then went over and saw it was a magician on stage. He used the fire from the four stand torches to create four large fire balls and juggled them. He then brought them together and a flock of birds appeared after the fire dissipated. That was an amazing trick.

"I gotta learn that trick!" Aang said with a grin.

"Thank you!" the performer said as he bowed. He then walked down stage as he spoke again. "For my next trick, I need a volunteer from the audience!"

"Oh! Oh!" Aang said as he waved his hand in the air like a child. "Me! Me!"

"Aang, what are you doing?" I sternly said to him as I pulled his arm down.

"I want to get a closer look." Aang said.

"We're supposed to lay low." I said.

"Roku's right." Katara said to him. "It's better that we don't attract any attention to ourselves."

"How about you, little lady?" the performer asked Katara.

"Uh…" Katara said as she backed away, showing she didn't want to do it.

"Awww, she's shy." The performer said to the crowd. "Leeet's give her some encouragement, folks!"

The crowd cheered and I watched as a kid wearing a mask pushed Katara to the stage and I watched as she was taken onto it.

"Awww! That could've been me." Aang said, crossing his arms out of jealousy.

I then felt someone's gaze and looked to the back of the crowd. In the very back, I saw a man wearing a cloak and a ninja mask staring at us. This was the same feeling I had in the forest. Had this guy been following us? I decided to wait for him to try anything and turned my focus back to the stage as the magician got a chair for Katara.

"This next trick is called 'Taming the Dragon!'" he said as he sat Katara on the chair and tied her up to it. "You will be my captured princess."

He then gathered all the fire and guided toward Katara, forming it into a dragon.

"Don't worry, young maiden!" the magician said as he guided the dragon around the stage. "I will tame this fiery beast!"

He then made a line of fire and placed it in the dragon, forming a leash. I knew what this was. He'll pretend the dragon broke loose and, at the last second when it's close to Katara, he'll redirect it and have it near him or something to finish the trick. I was correct when he dramatically said it was too strong and he couldn't hold it. Unfortunately, Aang didn't know it was just a trick.

"We gotta help her!" Aang said as he stepped forward.

"No! We don't want to make a scene!" Sokka said as he stopped him.

"The rope, it's breaking!" the magician said as he got rid of the leash and the dragon headed for Katara.

I was about to tell Aang it was a trick, but I was stopped when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned around to see that cloaked man I saw before. I then looked to see Aang jump onstage and airbended the dragon, causing it to turn into multicolor ashes. I looked and saw he had lost his mask.

"Hey, you're tryin' to upstage me, kid?" I heard the magician quietly said to Aang.

Aang tried to give them new entertainment by dancing, but the audience booed at him for ruining the trick. While he danced, me and the gang went on stage and Sokka untied Katara.

"Hey! That kid's the Avatar!" a man in the crowd said.

Aang stopped dancing, realizing he had lost his disguise. We all took off our masks as guards headed toward us.

"Uh-oh." I said, worriedly. "Time to go!"

"Follow me!" the man in the cloak said as we turned to see him at an unexpected exit. "I can get you outta here!"

"There they are!" a guard said as he and his squad got on stage.

We then ran and followed the man, who set off explosives at the guards chasing us.

"Over there!" another guard said as more began chasing us.

"I'm calling Appa." Aang said as he blew on his whistle.

"Hope he gets here in time!" Yosuke said as we kept running.

"This way!" the man said as we took a turn down an alley, but went running back when guards appeared on the other side. "Okay. Not this way!"

The man then threw a smoke bomb at the guards, allowing us to escape through a nearby alley. Unfortunately, we were at a dead end with an enormous box of fireworks.

"Appa, down here!" Aang yelled as we all looked to see the bison appear at the nick of time.

Appa landed between us and the guards, facing us. By using his tail, Appa airbended a gale force wind that blew the guards away. We all then got on Appa and took off before the guards got to us. Before we got too far away, the man armed a bomb and tossed it into the supply of fireworks, causing it to explode and create a beautiful display of them.

"Nice touch setting off the fireworks." Aang said as the man took off his hood.

"You really know you're explosives." Sokka said, impressed by the man.

"I'm familiar." The man said as he turned to us.

When we got a good look at him, we saw he was from the Fire Nation.

"You're a Fire Nation soldier!" Sokka said in shock.

"Was." The man said to us. "My name's Chey."

"Chey?" I said as that name jogged my memory. "As in Captain Chey? The explosives expert?"

"That's me." He said.

"You know him?" Yosuke asked me.

"Yeah, Chey left the Fire Nation three years ago." I said, which shocked the group.

After we landed, I then began questioning him.

"What are you doing in the forest?" I asked him as we sat around the fire.

"I serve a man." Chey answered. "More than a man really. He's a myth, but he's real. A living legend, Jeong-Jeong the deserter."

That shocked me, Hiriko, and Kioko for we knew that man.

" _The_ Jeong-Jeong?" I asked.

"Who's Jeong-Jeong?" Seiichi asked.

"Jeong-Jeong was once a Fire Nation admiral. But, like us, he couldn't take the injustice anymore." I told him. "Over ten years ago, he left. He was the first person to leave the Fire Nation and live."

"Yes. I'm the second, but you don't get to be a legend for that. That's okay though." Chey said. "Jeong-Jeong's a firebending genius. Some say he's mad, but he's not! He's enlightened."

"You mean there's a Firebender out there who's not with the Fire Lord?" Aang said with a smile before he got up with an excited tone. "We've gotta go see him! He can train me!"

"We're not gonna go find some crazy Firebender!" Sokka snapped out.

"He's not crazy! He's a genius!" I said to him. "And I can't think of anyone else who's more perfect to teach Aang."

"How do you know?" Katara asked.

"Because he trained my dad." I aid to her, which surprised everyone. "So, if any can teach Aang how to firebend, it's Jeong-Jeong."

"Yeah. That's why I followed you into the festival." Chey said.

"So it's settled." I said. "We're going to see Jeong-Jeong."

"What?!" Sokka said, shocked. "What about the North Pole?"

"Sokka, this could be my only chance to meet a firebending master who would actually be willing to teach me." Aang said to him.

"It can't hurt just to talk to him." Katara said as she stood up.

"That's what you said about going to the festival!" Sokka said, annoyed. "Why doesn't anyone listen to me?"

As Sokka turned, he nearly ran into a spear. In an instant, we were surrounded by men wearing straw hats, light armor, tribal makeup, and wielding spears.

"Don't…move." One of the men said.

We were soon escorted through the forest by the men.

"Jeong-Jeong told you not to look for Avatars." The man said to Chey.

"Hold on, you know these guys?" Tadaaki asked Chey.

"Oh, yeah! Lin Yee's an old buddy!" Chey said before turning to the man. "Right, Lin Yee?"

"Shut up! Keep moving." Lin Yee said, motioning with his spear.

We were taken to a hill with a cottage made of leaves and logs and a river at the foot of it.

"Go on." Lin Yee said to Chey. "He sees you only."

"Oh, that's okay." Chey said to him. "We can chat later."

"Is that where Jeong-Jeong is?" Aang said. "I need to talk to him right away."

Aang tried to head to the cottage, but lyin Yee stopped him.

"No! You wait there." Lin Yee said to Aang, just before he pushes Chey forward. "Go now!"

"Don't worry! Everything'll be fine." Chey assured us. "He's a great man. Great man!"

We then waited on the hill as Chey walked toward the cottage. It was only a few hours later that Chey came back with a downcast look, sitting across from me and Aang.

"What happened?" Aang asked. "Can I see Jeong-Jeong now?"

"He won't see you." Chey answered. "He's very angry that I brought you here. He wants you to leave immediately."

"Finally! Let's hit the road." Sokka said as he got up.

"Why won't he see me?" Aang asked.

"He says you're not ready." Chey said. "Says you haven't mastered waterbending and earthbending yet."

"Wait, how does he know that?" Aang asked, shocked by the fact.

"He saw the way you walked into camp." Chey said. "He could tell."

I then got up and began walking down the hill.

"Roku, where are you going?" Aang asked.

"I'm going to talk to Jeong-Jeong." I said. "I'll try to change his mind on training you."

I steadied myself before entering the cottage through the flap. It was filled with darkness except for an arc of candles on the floor, illuminating an old man sitting within it with his back towards me.

"Get out." He said to me strictly without even turning around.

"Master Jeong-Jeong," I said to him, "I need you to teach Aang how to firebend."

"Only a fool seeks his own destruction." He said. "Much like your friend, young Fire Dragon."

"Wait, how did you…?"

"Your father was my best student. It didn't take me long to find out."

"Then you know why I'm here. Me and Aang are the Avatars. It's our destiny to…"

"Destiny?" he said, interrupting me. "What would a boy know of destiny? If a fish lives its whole life in this river, does he know the river's destiny? No! Only that it runs on and on, out of his control! He may follow where it flows, but he cannot see the end. He cannot imagine the ocean."

"Okay. I get what you're saying." I said to him. "We can't foresee the future, but it's the Avatars duty to master all of the bending disciplines."

"To master the bending disciplines, you must first master discipline itself. You might seek it, but your friend haves no interest in this, so I have no interest in you. Now, get out."

"Master Jeong-Jeong, Aang needs to learn all four elements and this could be his only chance to learn firebending."

"Are you deaf? If he is as ignorant as you, how can I teach him if he refuses to listen?" he said as he turned to me in anger. "Before learning firebending, he must learn water and earth, just like you. You have mastered air, so you are enlightened. Water is cool and soothing, earth is steady and stable, but fire, fire is alive. It breathes, it grows. Without the bender, a rock will not throw itself. But fire will spread and destroy everything in its path if one does not have the will to control it. That is its destiny! He is not ready! He is too weak!"

I was shocked by what he just said. How could this be my father's teacher? The man who taught him the very basics of firebending? This is what got me mad.

"You're saying that you won't train Aang because you think he's weak?" I said to him with a glare. "You think the Avatar is weak? Do you even hear yourself? You've just insulted all the Avatars of the past, including Roku!"

"What did you say?" Jeong-Jeong said.

"You heard what I said. The Avatar has mastered the elements over a thousand times in a thousand lifetimes and must now do it again! But it is even more important than ever! By the time summer is at an end, there will be nothing left if me and Aang don't master the elements!" I then calmed down before speaking again. "Master, I beg of you. Help Aang learn firebending. Please."

Jeong-Jeong gave it some thought. I didn't look up to conceal my face as I pray for him to help us.

"Fine." Jeong-Jeong said as I looked up at him. "I will teach your friend."

"Oh, thank you, Master Jeong-Jeong." I said with a grateful smile.

When we got to the others and I told Aang Jeong-Jeong would teach him, he was excited.

"You'll teach me?" Aang said with a grin. "Really?"

"Yes, yes, I will teach you." Jeong-Jeong said to him.

"That's great!" Aang said as he lifted his arms in enthusiasm.

Even though I chuckled at that, Jeong-Jeong only groaned in despair. The next morning, Sokka decided to go fishing in the river and I practiced waterbending with Katara while Aang began training with Jeong-Jeong with the others watching. Aang stood, bandy legged on a flat rock in the river while Jeong-Jeong stood on the bank in front of his cottage only four feet away from Aang.

"Widen your stance." Jeong-Jeong said as Aang spread his stance out. "Wider!" Aang spread his stance a bit stance a bit wider. "Bend your knees." Aang then deepened his stance. "Now, concentrate." Aang then gave a weird stern look as he concentrated. Jeong-Jeong then walked over to the bank. "Good, good."

"Wait! What do I do now?" Aang said as he broke off that look.

"Silence!" Jeong-Jeong said as he turned to him. "Talking is not concentrating. Look at your friends, are they talking?" he motioned to me and Katara when he said that before he motioned to Sokka. "Even that oaf knows to concentrate on what's he's doing."

"Hey!" Sokka said, feeling insulted by the remark.

"But what am I concentrating on?" Aang asked Jeong-Jeong.

"Feel the heat of the sun. It is the greatest source of fire." Jeong-Jeong said as he motioned to the rising sun. "Yet, it is in complete balance with nature."

"So when do I get to make some fire?" Aang asked.

"Concentrate!" Jeong-Jeong told him.

After Aang sighed, we all began to laugh a little, but stopped when he looked at us. He looked away, but I could tell he was embarrassed. Though I knew Aang was going through the basics. Firebending is not an easy task. If you don't have enough concentration, you'll lose control of the flame. Feeling the power of the sun is the first part of it. We Firebenders actually get our power from the sun. This is why we're our strongest during the day and our weakest during the night. Jeong-Jeong took Aang to a mountain for the next part of his training. It was only a few hours later when Jeong-Jeong came back and went into his cottage. It was just as much when Aang went to the cottage with an annoyed look on his face. I went over and overheard what they were saying from the flap.

"What are you doing here?" Jeong-Jeong said to Aang. "I did not tell you to stop."

"I've been training for hours!" Aang said, angel.

"You want to stop breathing?"

"I want you to stop wasting my time! I already know how to squat and breathe and feel the sun! I wanna know how to shoot fire out of my fingertips!"

Jeong-Jeong gruffly sighed before he spoke to Aang.

"I had a pupil once who had no interest in learning discipline. Unlike Natsuo, he was only concerned with the power of fire, how he could use it to destroy his opponents and wipe out the obstacles in his path. But fire is a horrible burden to bear. Its nature is to consume and, without control, it destroys everything around it."

Now I had known why Jeong-Jeong left the Fire Nation. He couldn't take the way the Fire Lord used firebending. Like I couldn't let Ozai use it for spreading injustice.

"Learn restraint or risk destroying yourself and everything you love." Jeong-Jeong said.

I then watched as Aang came out and began meditating on the stone. He was no doubt thinking about what Jeong-Jeong said to him, so I decided to continue practicing my waterbending. It was only a few hours later that Jeong-Jeong came out to find Aang meditating.

"I thought about what you said." Aang said without lifting his head. "I promise I'll be more patient."

"We're going to work with fire now." Jeong-Jeong said, making Aang look up at him.

"Oh, yeah!" Aang said as he excitedly airbended himself into the air and landed on the stone. He noticed how he acted and became serious. "I mean, let us begin."

Jeong-Jeong then grabbed a falling leaf in an instant and burned the center.

"Concentrate in the fire." Jeong-Jeong said as he gave Aang the leaf, which had now received a burnt hole in the middle. "I want you to keep the flame from reaching the edges of the leaf for as long as you can."

Aang groaned as he then began concentrating on the leaf. I knew this trick. My dad did this so I could learn how to control and manipulate fire. Now I see where he got the technique from.

"Master, there is trouble!" a man said as he appeared.

"What's going on?" Aang asked.

"Concentrate on your leaf!" Jeong-Jeong said as he and the man left.

"This is the worst firebending instruction ever." Aang said, annoyed. "All he does is leave me for hours to concentrate or breath."

"I'm sure there's a good reason." Katara said to him.

"But I'm ready to do so much more." Aang said.

"Well, my dad did this this exact thing to help me control fire." I said to him. "Try and see what you can do with it."

Aang then got into stance and breathed. I then watched as the leaf burst into a flame.

"I did it! I made fire!" Aang said excitedly as he held the flame.

"Aang, that's great, but you should take it slow." Katara said.

Aang pretended he pounded his fist on something and the flame grew larger, nearly knocking him off his balance.

"Careful!" I said to him.

"Now that's some firebending!" Aang said after regaining his balance.

He then firebended a stream to the sky. I was beginning to worry. I wasn't the only one.

"Aang, careful!" I said to him. "You'll hurt yourself!"

Aang then started playing with it by tossing it around himself.

"I wonder how that juggler did it." Aang said and I knew what he was gonna do.

"Aang, no!" I said, but I was too late as Aang tossed the flame into the air and spread it out.

I was able to dodge the flame burst, but Katara was burnt. She shrieked when the flames came to her. I examined her hands and saw they were burnt red.

"Katara!" Aang worriedly said as he came over to us. "I'm so sorry!"

"Aang, you shouldn't have rushed things like that." I said to him. "Mastering fire is a dangerous thing."

"I know!" Aang said. "Ugh! I'm such an idiot!"

"Katara, what's wrong?" Sokka said with concern as he came over to her. When he saw Katara's burnt hands, he looked at Aang with anger. "What did you do?"

"It was an accident!" Aang said to Sokka. "I was… Katara, I'm so…"

Aang was then tackled to the ground by Sokka, who looked ready to pumble him.

"I told you we shouldn't mess around with this! Look what you did! You burned my sister!" Sokka said.

I then grabbed and tossed Sokka off of Aang, staring at the warrior with anger.

"Sokka, enough!" I said to him. "It was an accident! It's not Aang's fault!"

We all then watched as Katara ran off crying. I looked to Aang to see a worried look on his face, no doubt he was feeling guilty for burning Katara.

"This is all your fault!" Sokka said to Jeong-Jeong after he got up and the firebending master walked over.

"I know." Jeong-Jeong said. "Now pack your things. You must leave immediately."

"I'm sorry, I didn't…" Aang said to Sokka, who didn't even look at him as he walked away. "I'm sorry."

I looked as Jeong-Jeong looked displeased at Aang as he stood next to him. I then went off to look for Katara. I found her sulking by a creek, no doubt due to the pain of her burns. I then watched as she placed her hands in the water, trying to cool them off. But then something amazing happened. I watched as her hands began to glow. They continued to glow after she got her hands out of the water. When the glow faded away, her hands were completely healed. It was like they were never burned at all.

"Katara," I said as she looked at me, looking as surprised I was, "how did you do that?"

"I…" Katara said as she looked down at her hands. "I have no idea."

"You have healing abilities." Jeong-Jeong said as we turned to him walking towards us. "The great benders of the Water Tribe sometimes have this ability."

"How do you know?" I asked him as he sat next to Katara.

"Living amongst the Earth Kingdom, I heard of Waterbenders having such power." Jeong-Jeong said before focusing his attention to Katara. "I've always wished I were blessed like you, free from this burning curse."

"But you're a great master." Katara said to him. "You have powers that I will never know."

"Water brings healing and life." Jeong-Jeong said. "But fire brings only destruction and pain. It forces those of burdened with its care to walk a razor's edge between humanity and savagery. Eventually, we are torn apart."

"That is true. The power of fire is dangerous." I said as Jeong-Jeong turned to me. "Left unchecked, it can bring pain and destruction. But, like water, it helps life. Many would use it, not just for protection, but also as a guide. My ancestors learned that a long time ago. They saw fire was more than a force of destruction. For as long as anyone can remember, it has helped with survival. Water can be just as dangerous. A growing tide can be overwhelming to even the strongest. The two might be different, but they are similar in some way. Like nature itself, they bring balance, to both themselves and the world. The way it seems to be is only the way it's used. The Fire Lord might use it to bring war, but it doesn't mean I can't be different, that we all can't be different. I'll show people that there is nothing to be afraid. I'll also show you, Jeong-Jeong, that fire can become more than just a flame as I'll use it to guide my team to save this world."

My words actually surprised Jeong-Jeong. In all my life, I never thought I would leave a firebending master speechless. But, suddenly, a burst of flames struck the water. We would've been burnt if Jeong-Jeong didn't stop the blast that headed for us. We looked to see three Fire Nation riverboats heading toward us.

"Go, get your friends and flee!" Jeong-Jeong told me and Katara. "Do not come back here or you will be destroyed. Hurry!"

We then got running back while Jeong-Jeong stayed there to face the riverboats. I looked back long enough to see Jeong-Jeong create a wall of fire over the river, blocking the river boats' path. We kept running and managed to find Sokka and the others preparing Appa.

"Katara, are you all right?" Sokka asked as we came over.

"I'm fine." Katara told him. "We've got to get out of here. Where's Aang?"

Sokka pointed to the cottage and we went over and found Aang sulking in it.

"Jeong-Jeong tried to tell me that I wasn't ready." Aang said with his back facing us. "I wouldn't listen. I'm never going to firebend again."

"You'll have to eventually." I told him.

"No, never again." Aang said.

"It's okay, Aang." Katara said to him. "I'm healed."

"What? How?" Aang asked in surprise, turning to us.

"Long story. But, right now, we have to get out of here." I told him. "Zhao and his soldiers are attacking!"

"Where?" Aang asked as he stood up.

"By the river." I told him. "They captured Jeong-Jeong."

"I have to help him!" Aang said as he ran off.

I soon followed foot. We soon managed to get to the beach. On the way, I could hear what was being said such as Jeong-Jeong warning Zhao not to fight us. Sound like they knew each other. Jeong-Jeong even told him he had never seen such raw power.

"Jeong-Jeong!" Aang yelled as we began running over to him.

"We'll see." Zhao said to Jeong-Jeong before turning to the soldiers. "Men, take the deserter!"

Jeong-Jeong was then surrounded by five Firebenders, making me and Aang look in worry. I then saw Jeong-Jeong smirked before the soldiers charged him with spears. In that moment, Jeong-Jeong surrounded himself in a ball of fire. When it dissipated, Jeong-Jeong was gone.

"It's a trick! He's run off into the woods. Find him!" Zhao angrily said as the soldiers went off to fins the firebending master. He then looked at us as we got ready to fight. "Let's find out what my old master has taught you."

We were both shocked to see that Zhao was one of Jeong-Jeong's students.

"You were Jeong-Jeong's student?" Aang said, set back a bit.

"Until I got bored." Zhao said and he sent fireballs at us.

Luckily, we dodged them and he only hit a tree.

"I see he taught you how to duck and run like a coward." Zhao said as we got ready for combat. "But I doubt he showed you what a Firebender is truly capable of!"

He then sent a stream of fire at us, but we dodged it.

"Whoa! Wild shot!" Aang said as the stream dissipated behind us.

"I'll show you wild!" Zhao roared as he sent blasts of fire at us in rage.

We managed to dodge them, but he was now starting a forest fire.

"He's an animal." I said to Aang.

"Yeah. No self-control." Aang said.

We both looked to the boats and then looked at each other with smirks.

"Thinking what I'm thinking?" I said.

"Oh, yeah." Aang said.

"Stand and fight, Avatars!" Zhao said as we looked to him.

"Oh, were we fighting?" Aang said to him, mockingly. "We thought you were just getting warmed up."

"I was." Zhao said as he firebended at us, no doubt burned at the remark.

The plan was to drag Zhao's fire to the boats. With all that anger, it'll be too late before he realizes what he'd done. We managed to dodge all his attacks.

"Is that all you got?" I mockingly said to him. "They must be making anyone an admiral if that's the worse you can do!"

We then went over to the ships and Aang stood on top of the nearest ship we got to and cupped his hands to amplify his voice.

"Ahoy!" Aang said before shaking his butt tauntingly at Zhao. "I'm Admiral Zhao!"

Zhao got angrier, went over, and fired at us, setting fire to the ship.

"Ha! You missed!" I said to Zhao. "I thought you would have better aim than Zuko!"

Aang looked in disappointment at Zhao, but both of us looked in shock as we ducked from another attack.

"Sloppy. Very sloppy." Aang said as we got up.

We dodged the blasts until we got to the last ship, where Zhao thought he got us.

"Nowhere to run now, you little brats." Zhao said as he tried to burn us.

We managed to dodge them and had him burn the ship.

"You've lost this battle." I said to him.

"Are you crazy?" Zhao said after we dodged another attack. "You haven't thrown a single blow!"

"No, but you have." I said as I gestured to the ships. He looked in enraged disbelief as he saw his own ships sink. "Jeong-Jeong did say you had no restraint. Guess that's why my dad was a better student than you. With such a hot temper, you would burn everything around you before you even noticed."

Me and Aang then jumped into the water before Zhao's anger made the fire burst with him in it.

"Have a nice walk home!" Aang said to Zhao as we popped out of the water, knowing it was gonna take a lot more than that to take the admiral out.

"Guys, come on! Let's go!" Tadaaki said as he and the others waited for us on the shore on Appa.

We went over and took off in an instant to get away from Zhao.

"Wait, where's Jeong-Jeong?" Aang asked, remembering that Jeong-Jeong was still out there.

"He disappeared." Sokka answered as we all looked down. "They all did."

We saw that the village was abandoned, everyone was gone. Though I looked to see that Chey was left behind, probably a little annoyed that they left without him. I bet Zhao was pretty angry now. We all took a breather as Appa flew above the clouds.

"Aang, you're burned." Katara said, noticing a burn on Aang's forearm. "Let me help you."

Katara then gathered up some water from her flask ad used it to heal Aang's arm, amazing our group.

"Wow, that's good water." Aang said as his arm was completely healed.

"You're a healer." Seiichi said in amazement.

"When did you learn how to do that?" Sokka asked her.

"I guess I always knew." Katara shrugged.

"Oh…" Sokka said before speaking to her sarcastically. "Well then thanks for all the first aid over the years. Like when I fell into the greaseberry bramble." Then in anger. "Or that time I had two fish hook in my thumb!"

"Two?" Aang said, shocked.

"How did you get two hooks in your thumb?" I asked.

"He tried to get the first fish hook out with another fish hook." Katara said, amused.

"Oh, and the time that mink snake bit me!" Sokka said, sarcastically again. "Thanks for healing that up. That was great. _Really_ great."

The complaints continued on as Sokka listed the times he got hurt. Though I got to say I was surprised by what Katara did. I didn't even know Waterbenders could do that. This had made me more excited to learn waterbending. I might be able to learn techniques I never knew existed. I would also be honored to learn it with the two benders who helped me so far.


	14. Chapter 13: The Northern Air Temple

**Chapter 13: The Northern Air Temple**

It was night and we were with other groups of travelers, sitting around a campfire and listening to a man telling a story about Airbenders. Yes, Airbenders. Apparently their history hadn't been completely wiped out.

"So, travelers," the storyteller said to us as he finished his story, "the next time you think you hear a strange, large bird talking, take a closer look. It might not be a giant parrot, but a flying man. A member of the secret group of air walkers, who laugh at gravity and laugh at those bound to the earth by it."

"Aren't Airbender stories the greatest?" Aang asked us as the man began collecting coins from the other travelers.

"Was it realistic?" Hiriko asked, excitedly. "Is that how it was back then?"

"I laugh at gravity all the time." Aang said before he chuckled to himself. "Gravity."

"Jingle, jingle!" the man said as he came over to us, expecting us to pay.

Sokka searched his cloak, but only had a bug, a worm, and a few crumbs.

"Sorry." Sokka said to him.

"Aww, cheapskates!" the man said in an upset tone as he walked away from Sokka.

Sokka put the contents back in his pocket as Aang ran over to the man.

"Hey, thanks for the story!" Aang happily said to him as he kneeled in front of an old man.

"Tell it to the cap, boy." The man said as he held up and shook the hat behind him.

I knew a coin fell out from that shaking for Momo managed to find one and put it into the hat as Aang searched for some coins on him. The man turned around and smiled gratefully at Momo.

"Aww, much oblige, little bat-thing." The man said as he petted the lemur.

"It means a lot to hear Airbender stories." Aang said as he gave up looking for a coin and Momo hopped back on him. "It must have been a hundred years ago your great-grandpa met them."

"What are you prattling on about, child?" the man said, confused by what Aang said before motioning to the old man he was kneeling to. "Great Grandpappy saw the air walkers last week."

With that ringing in my ears, I went over as the old man laughed and waved at us weakly. Hiriko also came along.

"He saw Airbenders?" I said, shocked. "Where?"

"Somewhere over the mountains." The man said as he directed to a mountain range.

With the island we were on, I knew where he was talking about.

"Impossible." I said to the man. "That's the Northern Air Temple over there. The place has been abandoned for over a century."

"If you think so, then why not see for yourself?" the man said. "Great Grandpappy swears he saw them flying."

Most of the group was shocked and in disbelief. Airbenders still inhabiting an Air Temple? That was something worth checking out. The next morning, we took Appa and headed for the Northern Air Temple.

"We're almost at the Northern Air Temple." Aang said as he steered Appa. "This is where they had the championships for Sky Bison polo."

"Do you guys think we'll really find more Airbenders?" Hiriko asked us with an eager look on her face.

"You want me to be like you or totally honest?" Sokka asked as he whittled a piece of wood.

"Are you saying I'm a lair?" Hiriko asked with an angry expression and her arms crossed.

"I'm saying you're an optimist." Sokka shrugged. "Same thing, basically."

"We might see some Airbenders." I said. "Though I would still wonder how they managed to remake their home at the temple without any interference from Fire Nation soldiers."

"Hey, guys, look at this!" Aang excitedly said as we all looked to see the Northern Air Temple.

It was similar to the Southern Temple, except it boasted green instead of blue and the spires weren't as decorated. But I noticed that there were actual changes to it like the smoke coming out of the temple in small streams. Though we looked to see people flying. Though when we took a closer look, mine, Hiriko's, and Aang's joy instantly disappeared.

"They really are Airbenders!" Katara said, excitedly.

"No, they're not." Aang said with his arms crossed.

"What are you mean 'they're not'?" Sokka said, exuberantly. "Those guys are flying!"

"Actually, Aang's right." I said, depressed. "They're not flying, they're gliding. You can tell by the way they're moving. If they were airbending it would be more free than this."

"Yeah. Those people have no spirit." Aang said, bitterly.

Suddenly, one of those people flew right over us, nearly knocking me and the group off the saddle. When I got a closer look, it was a boy in a wheel chair with some kind of glider attached to it. He laughed as he flew around us.

"I don't know, Aang." Katara said before she pointed to the boy. "That kid seemed pretty spirited."

"More like nuts!" Yosuke said, angel. "He nearly crashed into us!"

As the boy flew in front of us, he shot a glance at Aang, who had a devilish grin, he then opened up his glider and took off to follow the boy. The instant he left, we were surrounded by gliders as we got closer to the temple.

"Looks like we got some attention, eh, Hiriko?" I asked, but she didn't respond.

I then looked to see her take off after Aang and the boy with a devilish grin of her own. Some of the gliders nearly hit Appa, which caused me and others to be knocked into the back of the saddle.

"We better find some solid ground before it finds us." Sokka said and I then went over to the reins and got us safely to the courtyard and out of that hazardous sky.

From there, we then watched as Aang and that boy started competing in the air. There were several children cheering for the boy.

"Go, Teo!" one of the children said.

"Show that bald kid how it's done!" another child said.

"Come on, Aang!" Tadaaki yelled as I looked to see him and the others cheering him on. "Show that kid what a real Airbender can do!"

There was a late entry from Hiriko, who completed against them. we watched as they did all kinds of tricks such as Aang letting his glider fly on its own while he ran along the wall on foot and on an air scooter before getting back on his glider, that kid Teo creating a white smoke image of Aang's annoyed face and Hiriko actually creating a smoke cyclone from the image and sent a smoke cloud at Teo, which he made through safely, but ended up coughing up. When they got back on the ground, we watched as the kids got the glider off Teo's chair and he rolled over to us.

"Hey, you're a real Airbender." Teo said as he got a closer look at Aang. "You must be the Avatar! That's amazing! I-I've heard stories about you!"

"Thanks." Aang said as he rubbed his head in embarrassment.

"Well, he's not the only Avatar here." I said as I revealed my tail and put out my hand to him. "My name's Roku Tengen."

"Teo." He said as he shook my hand. "It's an honor to meet you."

"It's great to meet you too." I said to him. "You know, my cousin Hiriko over there is an Airbender too."

"You are?" Teo said as he looked to Hiriko with surprise.

"Yes, but I'm still learning the basics." Hiriko said to him.

"Well, with the way you made that cloud, I say you're already a great Airbender." Teo said, making Hiriko smile with a blush.

"Wow!" Sokka said as he went over and examined Teo's chair and the glider. "This glider chair is incredible!"

"You think this is good, wait until you see the other stuff my dad designed." Teo said as he led us inside the temple.

He led us to a room full of pipes and machinery. Aang looked at it with worry. I would too. Nothing in the temple seemed to be spared. Though Sokka didn't seem to share that feeling.

"Wow!" Sokka said as he ran up to one of the machines.

"Yeah, my dad is the mastermind behind this whole place. Everything's powered by hot air." Teo said as we watched some women used an elevator. "It even pumps hot air currents outside to give us a life while we're gliding."

"This place is unbelievable." Aang said, keeping that look on his face.

"Yeah, it's great, isn't it?" Teo said to him.

"No, just unbelievable." Aang said as he walked away.

"Aang used to come here a long time ago." Katara said with a disappointed expression. "I think he's a little shocked it's so…different."

"So better!" Sokka said out loud.

"Sokka!" I said to him with a glare.

Me, Hiriko, and Katara went over to Aang as we saw an Airbender mural destroyed by pipes sticking out of it.

"This is supposed to be the history of my people." Aang said as we all looked at the ruined mural.

Katara put a hand on Aang's shoulder, but he walked over to a fountain with an air bison statue on it. It was now ruined. The water was polluted green and the statue was turned into a smoke shaft.

"Ugh!" Aang said as he saw smoke come out of its mouth.

"I'm sure some parts of the temple are still the same." Katara said, walking up and placing a hand on Aang's shoulder.

We all went to a roofless building that looked completely untouched. Inside, statues of monks were set amongst the walls, some sitting in meditation.

"It's nice to see that at least one part of the temple isn't ruined." Aang said in relief as we looked to a meditating monk statue.

"Look out!" a voice said.

From out of nowhere, a wrecking ball came in from the other side of the wall into the room. We all coughed from the dust created from it. I was shocked to see that the statue was destroyed as six men came in, standing in the statue's original spot. The man in the center had black hair, a scruffy beard, and a monocle. He wore a white apron over his Earth Nation clothing. I could tell that these people were just Earth Nation refugees. What they did made Aang upset and just angered me.

"What the doodle?" the man said to us. "Don't you know enough to stay away from construction sites? We have to make room for the bathhouse."

"Do you know what you did?!" Aang yelled in anger. "You just destroyed something sacred…for a stupid bathhouse!"

"Well, people around here are starting to stink." The man said, waving his hand in front of his face to emphasize.

"This whole place stinks!" Aang yelled as he pointed at the man.

He then airbended the crane off the cliff, utterly destroying it.

"This is a sacred temple. You can't treat it this way." Aang said as he walked over to the man. "I've seen it when the monks were here. I know what it's supposed to be like."

"The monks?" the man said, stretching his beard in confusion. "But you're twelve."

"Dad, he's the Avatar." Teo said as he rolled up to the man. "He used to come here a hundred years ago."

"What are you doing?" Aang asked as he made the man take a step back out of fear. "Who said you could be here?"

"Hmm, doing here…" the man said as he gave some thought. "A long time, but not a hundred years ago, my people became refugees after a terrible flood." He then walked up behind his son's wheelchair. "My infant son, Teo, was badly hurt and lost his mother." Teo looked down in depression. The man sniffled before speaking again. "I needed somewhere to rebuild and I stumbled across this place. Couldn't believe it! Everywhere, pictures of flying people!" he then looked around. "But empty, nobody home." He then did a glider-like gesture like he was flying around. "Then I came across these fan-like contraptions!"

"Our gliders." Aang said with his arms crossed, still glaring at the man.

"Yes. Little, light flying machines." The man said, waving his hands up and down. "They gave me an idea: build a new life for my son in the air! Then everyone will be on equal ground! So to speak. We're just in the process of improving what's already here." Now I was feeling a little sorry for the man. "And, after all, isn't that what nature does?"

"Nature also knows where to stop." I said to him. "You kinda destroyed some sacred Air Nomad artifacts."

"I suppose that's true." The man said. "Unfortunately, progress has a way of getting away from us." He then pointed to three large candles as he spoke again. "Look at the time." He then turned to the workers. "Come, the pulley system must be oiled before dark."

"Wait, how can you tell the time from that thing?" Sokka said as he walked over to the candles. "The notches all look the same."

"The candle will tell us." The man said as they looked to the candle. "Watch."

Then, suddenly, the flame popped four times, surprising all of us.

"You put spark powder in the candle!" Sokka said, realizing what had happened.

"Four flashes." The man said. "So it's exactly four hours past mid-day or, as I call it, four o'candle."

Sokka laughed at the joke which was as funny as his own. It had appeared that toe's father was pleased by Sokka's interested in these inventions.

"If you like that, wait till you see my finger-safe knife sharpener." The man said as he held up his left hand, which had his three last fingers made out of wood. "Only took me three tries to get it right."

The man pull them off and tossed them into Sokka's hand, who yelled in horror from it.

"Follow me!" the man said after tapping Sokka's shoulder with his remaining finger and gestures him to follow. Sokka then ran after him.

"Hey, Aang." Teo said as we looked to him. "I want to show you something."

He then began leading us to another part of the temple, Aang still worried that everything in the temple had changed.

"I still can't get over it." Aang said as we walked. "There's not a single thing that's the same."

"I don't know about that." Teo said as he stopped, picked up this strange, little, black and white striped crab off the ground, and handed it to Katara. "The temple might be different, but the creatures that live here are probably direct descendants of the ones who lived here a long time ago."

"You're right." Katara said as she petted the crab. "They're kind of keepers of the temple's origins."

She then handed it to Aang. He smiled as it moved around in his hand.

"Besides, there's one part of the temple that hasn't changed at all." Teo said.

We were then led to one thing we were all familiar with: a temple door.

"Only an Airbender can open it, so inside, it's completely untouched. Just the way the monks left it." Teo said, confidently. "I always wondered what it's like in there."

"Aang?" Katara asked, looking at the Airbender.

"I'm sorry." Aang answered as he looked away from us. "This is the last part of the temple that's the same as it was. I want it to stay that way."

"Yeah, I don't think we can handle losing anything like this." I said.

"I completely understand." Teo told us, somewhat disappointed. "I just wanted you yo know it was here."

"Thanks." Aang said as we all walked away from the door.

I only learned this from Sokka. As it turned out, there was a room full of natural gas beneath the temple. Teo's father came across it the first time he was there while he was caring a torch. He nearly blew himself and the temple up. They managed to pluck it up, but there were leaks in the plugs that were nearly impossible to find. Basically, if any source of fire would get down there, the whole temple whole be destroyed. He now needed to find a way to find something he couldn't see, hear, smell or touch. While they did this, we were giving Katara and the others their first gliding lesson. This excluded Hiriko, of course. Tadaaki was eager to start. He always wanted to fly.

"The wind will carry you." Teo said, telling the others how to glide. "It supports something inside you. Something even lighter than air. And that something takes over when you fly."

"Well, then…" Tadaaki said as he got ready to jump. "Time to fly!"

In an instant, he ran off the cliff and began falling, but soon began flying. He laughed out in victory as he soared above us.

"Come on, guys!" he said to us. "The air is great!"

"I've changed my mind." Katara nervously said, afraid of jumping off the edge. "I think I was been without that something."

Teo laughed before saying "Impossible! Everybody has it!"

"Spirit." Aang said as we looked to him.

"What?" Teo asked.

"Spirit." Aang answered. "That's the something you're talking about."

"Yeah, I suppose it is." Teo said, thoughtfully.

Katara and the others got ready to jump, all four of them equally nervous.

"Are you ready?" Teo asked them.

"No!" Katara said.

They all then began running. They were screaming at first, but soon began laughing as they began flying. Me, Hiriko, and Aang then went off to join them in the sky.

"I can't believe I'm flying!" Katara said as me, Aang, and Momo flew next to her.

"Just make sure you keep your mouth closed so you don't swallow a bug." Aang told her.

We then watched as Momo chomped a bug that flew over to him.

"Teo was right about the air." Katara said. "All I had to do was trust it, let it carry me."

"Even though Teo's not an Airbender, he really does have the spirit of one!" Aang said with a smile.

"You got that right!" I said as we then flew over and landed next to Teo.

"I've been thinking." Aang said to him. "If you want to see what's in that room, I'd be happy to open the door for you."

"Yeah. With the way you show the true spirit of an Airbender, you've deemed yourself worthy of being one." I said to Teo.

"Great!" Teo said to us.

"Wait!" Katara said as she flew by us. "How so I land this thing? What if I land over a-ack-ack! Bleck!"

"You okay up there?" I said to her.

"Bug! Bug! Ack, that was a bug!" she answered, showing she had just swallowed a bug.

She wasn't the only person having trouble. We had to show the others how to land safely. After that, we then began heading back to the door. While we did, Sokka hanged around Teo's father's workshop. With this, Sokka caused a few scrolls, pieces of paper, and a small hot air balloon with eggs in it. Toe's father said the balloon was an old experiment and that egg was part of last week's lunch. It was only when the rotten egg smell hit the air that they tried to find the egg. Back with us, we stood in front of the door, ready to enter the sacred room.

"Ready, Teo?" I asked him as we stood there.

"I can't believe I'm finally going to see what's inside!" Teo said, excitedly.

"Open the door, Aang!" I said and Aang nodded before using his airbending to open the door.

Back with Sokka and Teo's father, their search for the egg lead to the solution. By adding dozens of rotten eggs in the gas cellar, the smell would mix with the gas. So when there's a leak, you can follow the smell to where the leak is and plug it up. Then a bell on Teo's father's desk rand he told Sokka something was wrong and left to see. Sokka followed behind. Back with us, we entered the room, but were horrified to find Fire Nation weapons, tools, and a larger, red colored version of the balloon with the Fire Nation insignia on it within it.

"This is a nightmare." Aang said and he was right. This was a complete nightmare.

"You don't understand!" Teo's father said as he walked in with Sokka behind him.

"You're making weapons for the Fire Nation!" Aang said to him.

"You make weapons for the Fire Nation?!" Sokka asked in anger.

"Explain all this! Now!" Teo demanded.

His father was hesitant to answer, but resigned and began explaining.

"It was about a year after we moved here." He said. "Fire Nation soldiers found our settlement. You were too young to remember this, Teo. They were going to destroy everything, burn it to the ground! They asked what I had to offer. I offered…my services. You must understand I did this for you!"

Teo looked away from his father in shame, tears in his shut eyes. Teo's father left just as ashamed.

"We have to help them." I said to the group, surprising most of them.

"What?" Tadaaki asked.

"We can't let these people be forced to make these weapons or let the Fire Nation get them." I said.

"Why should we care?" Tadaaki said. "They lied to us the moment we got here. They made these to destroy the Earth Kingdom, to destroy us."

"I know, but that's still no reason to have them living feat of the Fire Nation." I said. "If we leave them, they'll never be safe."

"Roku is right." Aang said as we looked to him. "We have to help them."

"What? I thought you didn't like any of this!" Yosuke said in shock.

"I don't like how much this place has changed, but this doesn't mean I won't try to help." Aang said. "I know I can't undo any of this, but I can't let what happened to my people happen to anyone else. It might be different, but it's still my home. I won't let it be destroyed again."

It wasn't long until we got everybody's agreement in helping these refugees defend themselves. We then decided to go and help these people. Me, Aang, and Teo went off to face the mechanist.

"When are they coming?" I asked as we came into the workshop.

"Soon." Teo's father said as the candle popped once. "Very soon."

"You can't make them more weapons." I said to him.

"If I don't give them what they want, they will destroy this place!" he said.

We then watched as the model of the balloon we saw fell on the floor and caught on fire.

"How can I be proud of you when your inventions are being used for murder?" Teo said as his father put out the fire with a white cloth.

Teo's father looked at us with shame before saying "I need time to think."

His moment to think was cut short when a bell rang on his desk.

"You need to leave, go!" Teo's father said, motioning us to leave.

"We're not leaving!" Teo said as the three of showed how serious we were.

"Then hide, quickly!" Teo's father said as we hid behind some of his inventions.

He then pulled a rope that opened a trapdoor. On a rising platform, a war minister from the Fire Nation appeared with an impatience look on his face.

"You know better than to keep me waiting." The war minister said to Teo's father. "Give me what you owe us so we can be on our way." Teo's father looked down, no doubt worried on what he was doing. "Well? Is there a problem?"

"No, right this way." The mechanist hurriedly said, motioning to the door.

Before the mechanist could get to the door, Aang airbended it shut and he and I stood in front of it.

"The deal's off." I said to the minister.

"The Avatars." The minister said, surprised to see us.

"Roku, Aang, don't get involved!" the mechanist said to us.

"If I don't get what I came here for, the Fire Nation will burn this place to rubble!" the minister said to us.

"Get out of here!" Aang said as he used an air swipe to smack the minister in the face. "You're leaving empty-handed!"

"Then the destruction of this temple will be on your heads!" the minister said, pointing to us.

After he left, Aang airbended the trapdoor shut. After so, we gathered the others and told them what happened, causing them to worry.

"This is bad." Teo said.

"Very bad!" Kioko said.

"What are we going to do?" Yosuke asked. "How can we possibly keep them all away?"

"I tell you how." Aang said as we all looked to him. "We have something they don't." he then pointed to the sky as some gliders flew around. "Air power. We control the sky. That's something the Fire Nation can't do. We can win!"

"I want to help." The mechanist said as we looked to see him smiling at us.

"Good. We'll need it." I said.

The plan was simple. Using the mechanist's inventions, we would attack the Fire Nation troops. We could also use the hot air balloon against the Fire Nation in this attack with bombs. The only problem was how to get the balloon going without losing control of it. We met up with the mechanist and Sokka in the workshop for they found the solution.

"We finally got the war balloon working, thanks to Sokka." The mechanist said. "This boy's a genius!"

"Thanks you." Sokka said to him. "You're a genius!"

"Thank you!" the mechanist said as me and the group exchanged unamused looks.

"See, the problem with the old war balloon was you could get it airborne, but once it did, it just kept going." Sokka said as he demonstrated by placing a candle in the model balloon and letting it float. It had a string so he was able to pull it back down. "You could get a hole in the top, but then all the hot air would escape. So the question became how do you keep a lid on hot air?"

"Ugh, if only we knew." Katara said, commenting on Sokka being full of it.

"You got that right." I said, commenting on how Yosuke was full of hot air himself.

All of us except Yosuke laughed at that.

"A lid is actually the answer!" Sokka said. "If you control the hot air, you control the war balloon."

"Huh." I said, impressed by this. "That's actually pretty smart."

"So what do we got for weapons?" Tadaaki asked, wanting to know what we had to defend ourselves with.

"We got four kinds of bombs: smoke, slime, fire, and…" Sokka said, listing with his fingers.

"Stink!" the mechanist finished him. "Never underestimate the power of stink!"

We all got outside, ready to set our attack and waiting for the first sign of the Fire Nation.

"They're coming!" a girl said as she looked over a ledge with worry.

"Are we ready?" Teo asked.

"Yes, but where's Sokka with the war balloon?" Katara said with worry.

"We'll have to start without it." Aang said as he got off Appa.

"Gliders to your positions!" I said as we all got ready to go.

Once we were all ready to go, we all went off to start the assault, the crowd cheering us on. Once we got sight of the soldiers below, we then dove and threw the bombs at them. The soldiers tried to use their spears on us, but we tossed some smoke and slime bombs at them, causing some to fall off the cliff. Aang used his air scooter to send snow at them. Our plan was working. The soldiers were now beginning to retreat. We went back to Appa to get some more bombs from the Waterbenders in the group. It seemed to be going accordingly until hooks came flying out of the clouds, nearly hitting Appa and latching onto the cliff behind him. I then watched as tanks began climbing the cliff. I've seen the tanks before. Me and the team went against them. Firebenders would not just use them for transportation, but defense as they attacked.

We tried everything to knock them off, but our bending, powers, or bombs didn't seem to faze them. They were unstoppable. At least they were until Teo told us that they used water as part of their design. So our Waterbenders managed to stop some by freezing the water in the tanks. I even saw one of those tanks fall apart from it. If we knew this before, we would've destroyed those tanks years ago. Though more kept on coming. We managed to block some of the attacks, but Appa managed to save us by sending some tanks away. We climbed onto him and took to the sky. We watched as the Fire Nation troops continued to the temple, ready to attack. We were all regrouped at the temple to think of a new strategy.

"We're out of bombs!" Teo said after checking inventory.

"What do we do now?" Tadaaki asked.

"We better hope that the war balloon gets here." I said.

"You mean that one?" Yosuke asked as he pointed to his right.

We all looked to see the war balloon heading towards the soldiers. The weirdest thing was that the balloon wasn't being shot down and the soldiers just ignored it.

"Hey, why aren't they firing at the war balloon?" Tadaaki asked.

"The insignia!" I said as I realized it. "They must think they're on their side."

"Oh, they are gonna be surprised." Tadaaki said as we watched the mechanist and Sokka sending large sacks full of slime bombs toward the soldiers, washing them away.

Though they managed to stop most of the troops, the tanks were still coming. I got this from Sokka. They were out of bombs, but found one in the form of a gas leak. While we tried to keep the tanks from advancing, Sokka took out the engine and he and the mechanist sent it over to the gas leak. Though they lost the balloon's fuel source, they managed to create an explosion big enough to get rid of the tanks and rattle the soldiers.

"Look!" Aang said as we watched the soldiers run back down the mountain. "They're retreating!"

"We won!" I yelled, cheerfully.

We all cheered for our victory. Our moment was cut short when we saw the balloon plummeting towards the bottom after Sokka yelled "We're going down!"

"No!" Katara said in worry.

"Hold on, guys!" I yelled as me and Aang went off after the balloon. "We're coming!"

I managed to save them after I caught Sokka's boomerang in my mouth. The boomerang was tied with a rope which allowed me to get him and the mechanist to safety. The balloon then continued on and crashed somewhere in the mist. Later that day, Aang then had a talk with Teo and the mechanist about the temple.

"You know what?" Aang said to them. "I'm really glad you guys all live here now." He then picked up a crab and used it as a demonstration. "I realized it's like the hermit crab. Maybe you weren't born here, but you found this empty shell and made it your home. And now you protect each other."

"That means a lot, coming from you." Teo said, making Aang smile.

"Aang, you were right about air power." Sokka said.

"Yeah. As long as we've got the skies, we'll have the Fire Nation on the run!" Tadaaki said and we all cheered.

Though I was grateful we had the advantage, but I also worried for what happened to the war balloon. If it was intact from the crash, then this defeat would only be the Fire Nation's gain. Though they would have to work twice as hard to have more of those balloons now that their inventor is no longer in their service. Until they get more of those things flying, it's now time to get a move one. It's time for me and Aang to learn waterbending. It's time to head…for the North Pole.


	15. Chapter 14: The Waterbending Master

**Chapter 14: The Waterbending Master**

There we were, flying close over to the ocean toward the North Pole. After months of traveling with Aang and the others, we were finally heading to the Northern Water Tribe, where me and Aang will finally learn waterbending.

"I'm not the one to complain, but can't Appa fly any higher?" Sokka grumpily said as he hanged lazily on the back of Appa's saddle.

We were all bored because we had been flying over the ocean for two days.

"I have an idea!" Aang irritably said as he angrily pointed to Sokka. "Why don't we all get on _your_ back and _you_ could fly all of us to the North Pole?"

"I'd love to." Sokka sarcastically said as he pointed to his back. "Climb on, everyone, Sokka's ready to take off."

Momo then climbed on Sokka's back, making him glare angrily at the lemur.

"Look, I know we're all tired and irritated from flying for two days straight." I said to everyone.

"And for what?" Sokka said. "We can't even find the Northern Water Tribe. There's nothing out here."

"It's not our fault that our tribe chose to live this far north." Yosuke said. "More likely it's you Southerners' fault for not staying in the north. At least we have a better life."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Sokka asked, annoyed.

"Oh, come on. Are you serious?" Yosuke said to Sokka. "The North Pole is like Omashu, an entire city."

"What's wrong with out tribe?"

"You guys live in igloos."

"They're still as good."

"Well, we still kept to our traditions."

"We have traditions."

"You barely have any. You guys have been so far from the north for so long, you have forgotten yourselves. That's the only reason our tribes barely see each other. Seeing how many times you messed up only proves my point."

"Why, you…" Sokka said, grabbing Yosuke as if he was going to kill him.

"Whoa! Whoa!" Seiichi said as he tried to end the fight. "Who cares where we're from? We might have different customs to each other, but we're all still part of the Water Tribe. Now let's end this fight and settle down."

Sokka then put Yosuke down and went back to sit at the back of the saddle.

"You two must be excited about this." I said to Yosuke and Seiichi.

"Are you kidding?" Yosuke said to me. "How could we not? We're finally going home!"

"Yeah." Seiichi said. "It's been so long since I've seen everyone. I can't wait to get back and go sailing with Owen and Nick, see my folks."

"I can't wait to get some of my mom's special sea prunes." Yosuke said. "Best ones I've ever tasted."

"Well, that's one dinner you'll never see me at." I said, still disgusted by the thought of eating sea prunes again.

We all then began sharing a laugh on it. We then heard some water slushing and looked forward to see ice spikes form right in front of us. Aang managed to dodge it, but some of it managed to freeze one of Appa's legs. We landed safely in the water, but Appa was trapped in a ring of ice. Though there was something familiar about this ice, like I've seen it happen before. It wasn't until we saw boats coming toward us with Waterbenders on board that our fright was turned into amazement.

"Those are our boats!" Yosuke said as Seiichi stood next to him, both of them smiling. "It's our tribe!"

The six boats then surrounded us as Seiichi went over to the top of Appa's head.

"Hey! Hey!" Seiichi yelled. "Guys, it's us! We're back!"

"Wait, Seiichi?" one of the Waterbenders said as he saw Seiichi.

"Akio!" Seiichi said to him. "Yeah, it's me! Yosuke's with me too!"

"Hey, Ak!" Yosuke said as he went over. "Haven't seen ya in a long time."

"You can say that again." Akio said as his boat came over to us. "What are you doing here?"

"We're coming to deliver the last hopes for the world. Guys, get up here!" Seiichi said as me and the others went over.

It was only when Akio saw Aang that he was shocked. He wasn't the only one as another boat came by.

"The Avatar?!" the Waterbender from the boat said. "How did you find him?"

"Daichi, is that you?" Yosuke asked.

"Yep. It's me." The Waterbender answered.

"I can't believe you're out here!" Jaret said. "I never thought you'd be on one of these boats."

"I still can't believe you're with one of the Avatars." Daichi said.

"With _both_ of the Avatars!" Seiichi said. "Show 'em, Roku!"

I then revealed my tail and they were all surprised by this.

"Whoa! I can't believe I'm meeting the two Avatars!" Daichi said. "It's an honor to meet you!"

"The pleasure's ours. I'm Roku Tengen. This is Aang." I said to him.

"What brings you here?" Akio asked.

"We were just heading to the North Pole so me and can find a master to teach us waterbending." I told him. "You mind escorting us to the tribe?"

"Not at all. Let's get going." Akio said as he and the other Waterbenders removed the ice and started taking us to the North Pole.

It was only a few hours later that Yosuke and Seiichi got up in excitement.

"There it is!" Seiichi said, pointing forward. "The Northern Water Tribe!"

We were all in awe as we saw the city's magnificent wall of ice. We were here, we were finally here.

"Seiichi, we're home." Yosuke said as we headed toward the wall.

The Waterbenders opened a tunnel for us to enter the city. We did and we were then inside a canal that local workers used to let us in the city.

"I can't believe how many Waterbenders live up here!" Katara said in fascination.

"Hey, we might not be as combat ready the south, but we Northerners can still defend ourselves." Yosuke said.

"We'll find a master to teach us in no time." I said.

Getting into the city, we were amazed by the very majesty of the city. Yosuke was right. It was lie Omashu and as breathtaking as seeing the Southern Air Temple. We certainly got the citizens attention as Aang waved at them as we went by, when we were traveling through the city, I noticed a girl on a boat that went past us. Sh had blue eyes and, strangely, white hair, white as snow. It was really strange to see this because that girl looked like my age. The only women I've seen with white hair were at old age. Though my focus was not on her, so I continued to look forward. I didn't know it, but that girl got Sokka's full attention.

"This place is beautiful." Katara said in amazement.

"Yeah." Sokka sighed, love-dazed. "She is."

We all looked to him standing on Appa's tail.

It didn't take us long to notice Sokka had some interest in that girl. It wasn't long until we met with the tribe's chief, Arnook. After we told him of our reason to come here, Arnook told us he would have Pakku teach us waterbending. Seiichi and Yosuke soon told us that Pakku was their waterbending teacher and warned us about him. Even though he was the greatest Waterbender there, they told us that he had a bit of a rough way of teaching. Before we met Pakku, Arnook threw a great celebration for me and Aang as a way of welcoming us to their tribe. Four Northerners were actually a bit frightened after they gave Appa some food. I could understand that. It's pretty shocking when you see your first air bison.

"Tonight, we celebrate the return of our children of the North and the arrival of our brother and sister from the Southern Tribe." Arnook announced to his people. "And they have brought with them two very special people, those whom many of us believed disappeared from the world until now: the Avatars!" the crowd applaud and cheered as me and Aang waved shyly, sitting to Arnook's left. "We also celebrate my daughter's sixteenth birthday." He then moved aside as we saw the girl from before walking toward the table, a kind smile upon her face. "Princess Yue is now of marrying age!"

"Thank you, Father." Yue said to Arnook before she turned to the crowd. "May the great Ocean and Moon Spirits watch over us during these troubled times!"

"Now Master Pakku and his students will perform!" Arnook said as he motioned to a gray haired Water Tribe man with a mustache and goatee opposite to us, Seiichi standing to his right and Yosuke to his left.

We then watched as the three of them waterbended three streams, captivating me, Aang, and Katara. They then merged them into one stream, bending it around them. I had to say, I was impressed.

"Hi, there." Sokka said as I looked to see him talking to Yue, who apparently went over to sit by him.

"Very nice to meet you." She said as she smiled and slightly bowed.

There was some silence between them until Sokka broke it.

"So…uhhh…you're a princess, huh?" Sokka said, nervously. Yue smiled and nodded "yes." "You know, back in my tribe, I'm kind of like a prince myself."

"Ha, prince of what?" Katara said to her brother, teasingly.

"A lot of things!" Sokka said, annoyed by her comment.

"Yeah, which is not a lot." I said to myself.

"Do you mind?" Sokka said to her. "I'm trying to have a conversation here."

"My apologies, _Prince_ Sokka." Katara sarcastically said as she gave a short bow to him.

When he looked back at Yue, he became nervous again.

"So, it looks like I'm going to be in town for a while." Sokka said to her. "I'm thinking…maybe we could do an activity together?"

I then tried to hold in a laugh from what Sokka said. "Do an activity together?" What kind of a line was that?

"Do an activity?" Yue said with some amusement.

I then watched as Sokka stuffed his face with food, obviously embarrassed by his attempt at courting. I wasn't the only one amused by this as I saw Katara with a smug.

"Very smooth." Katara highly said to Sokka.

After Pakku and the others were done, Arnook took us over to him to introduce us.

"Master Pakku, meet your new students, the Avatars." Arnook said as me and Aang bowed to the waterbending master.

"Master Pakku, it is an honor to be your students." I said to him. "If you don't mind, a waterbending friend of ours will be joining us."

"Fine." Pakku said to us. "But, just because you're destined to save the world, don't expect any special treatment."

"We can't wait to start training with you." Aang said. "After we relax for a few days."

"If you want to replace, then I suggest visiting a tropical island." He said to us. "If not, I'll see you all at sunrise. Good night."

He then walked off to rest for the night. The way he spoke to us might've been calm with a dull expression, but I could still feel some harshness from him. The next morning, me, Aang, and Katara headed off for our first lesson with Pakku.

"I've waited for this my whole life." Katara said, excitedly. "I finally get to learn from a real waterbending master!"

When we got to Pakku, he was bending some water and deeply concentrated on it.

"Good morning, Master Pakku!" Aang yelled out, making Pakku drop the water.

"No, please, march right in." Pakku said with annoyance. "I'm not concentrating or anything."

"Sorry about that." I said to him. I then motioned to Katara. "This is our friend, Katara. The one we told you about?"

He then looked at Katara and his expression didn't change.

"I'm sorry. I think there's been a misunderstanding." Pakku said as he waterbended an ice chair for himself. "You didn't tell me your friend was a girl."

"Is there a problem?" I asked.

"In our tribe, it is forbidden for women to learn waterbending." Pakku said, making Katara look at him in anger.

"What do you mean you won't teach me?" Katara angrily said as she walked over to Pakku. "I didn't travel across the entire world so you could tell me no!"

"No." Pakku said to her.

"Master Pakku, please. She wants to learn waterbending just as much as me and Aang." I said to him. "Certainly there must be other female Waterbenders in your tribe."

"Here, the women learn from Yugoda to use their waterbending to heal." Pakku said before putting his attention back to Katara. "I'm sure she would be happy to take you as her student despite your bad attitude."

"I don't want to heal, I want to fight!" Katara said.

"I can see that." Pakku said. "But our tribe haves customs, rules."

This only made Katara furious as she said "Well, your rules stink!"

"Yeah, they're not fair!" Aang said, just as angry as Katara. "If you won't teach Katara, then…"

"Then what?" Pakku asked.

"Then I won't learn from you!" Aang said as he began walking away.

"Well, have fun teaching yourself." Pakku said, sarcastically. "I'm sure you'll do a great job."

"Wait, Aang didn't mean that." Katara said to Pakku. She then went after Aang. "You can't risk your training for me. You have to learn from Master Pakku, even if he is a big jerk."

Even though Aang agreed to do it, I wasn't willing to be that man's student. What he said there really ticked me off.

"Well, I'm not gonna learn from him." I said and I turned to Pakku. "Listen to me. I don't care what you think. Katara's been more help to me than you ever could. She's the reason I even know some waterbending. If you're not gonna teach her because of your ridiculous rules, then you're not going to be my master."

"Then I suggest you leave then." Pakku said to me.

"Fine by me." I said as I then walked away. "Good riddance, you old grouch!"

I didn't care if that man was my only chance to learn waterbending, I was not gonna learn from someone who wouldn't teach the one person who had been helping me with waterbending from the very start. I got this form Yosuke and Seiichi. In another part of the city, the two followed Sokka as he followed yi to talk to her with the princess on a boat.

"Princess Yue, good morning!" Sokka said as he caught up with her. "How about that picnic last night? Boy, your dad sure does know how to throw a party."

"I'm happy you enjoyed yourself." Yue said to him.

"Well, it wasn't much fun after you left." Sokka said, causing Yue to blush, which in turn made him blush. "So, I'm still hoping we can see more of each other."

"Do an activity, you mean?" Yue asked.

This caused a snicker from both Seiichi and Yosuke.

"Yes." Sokka said, nervously. "At…a place…for some time."

"I'd love to." Yue said. "I'll see you on that bridge tonight."

Yue pointed to the bridge in front of them.

"Great! I'll see you—Aah!" Sokka said as he then fell into the water.

He was so focused on Yue that he didn't realize he hit a corner of the canal.

Yue laughed a little as Sokka popped his head out of the water and said "Sorry."

"That's okay. It was worth it." Sokka said as he climbed out of the water and laid on his back with a blissful look on his face. "See you tonight."

Both Yosuke and Seiichi were worried about this. They knew something that could break his heart. With the way it seemed, the two of them were worried how much it would affect Sokka. The two huddled and whispered to each other to figure out a way on how to tell Sokka the truth about Yue.

"Should we tell him?" Seiichi asked.

"We have to." Yosuke said. "He's gonna be crushed to tonight if we don't. Maybe you should tell him."

"What?!" Seiichi said. "No, you tell him!"

"You're the most honest person I know. He'll trust you more."

"You should tell him. You have lots of experience on being dumped."

"What are you two talking about?" Sokka said as the two Waterbenders turned to look at him standing with a confused look.

They then look at Sokka nervously and steadied themselves.

"Well, Sokka," Seiichi said to him. "It's about tonight."

"What about it?" Sokka asked.

"Well, it's just…um…" Seiichi said, trying to figure out what to say. He then looked to Yosuke. "Yosuke, help me." His eyes widen in shock as he found Yosuke gone. "Yosuke?"

He then looked to the bridge and saw Yosuke running away.

"Sorry, Seiichi!" Yosuke yelled as he ran out of sight. "You're on your own!"

"Yosuke, you coward!" Seiichi said, angered by Yosuke ditching him. He then cleared his throat and calmly spoke to Sokka as he realized he was the only one left to tell Sokka. "Okay. Well, um… I just…want to wish you luck. You'll be a lucky guy to hand out with Yue."

"You know her?" Sokka asked.

"Of course." Seiichi said. "Me, Yosuke, and Yue grew up together. I know exactly what she likes. I'll help you impress her."

"Really?" Sokka asked with surprise.

"Of course." Seiichi said. "Now let's get you ready for tonight."

The two then walked for Seiichi to prepare Sokka for his meet up with Yue. He was doing this to avoid telling Sokka the truth. He's been known to always tell the truth and he was now keeping it away from a friend. Back with me, I decided to accompany Katara as she began learning how to heal with waterbending.

"Um, hi." Katara said as we entered the hut. "Are you Yugoda?"

"Are you here for the healing lesson?" the woman at the center of the room asked her.

I looked around the room and saw the call was filled with little girls.

"I guess I am." Katara said, disappointed at this.

"Welcome, welcome." Yugoda kindly said as Katara took a seat.

I took a seat and it brought some confusion from the class.

"If it's okay with everyone, I want to see the healing tactics you have here." I said to Yugoda. "They might not be combatant, but I would like to use them on my journey."

"That is quite alright, young Avatar." Yugoda said with a kind smile.

Back with Aang, he was having trouble waterbending. Like with Jeong-Jeong, Aang was becoming frustrated with the way Pakku taught. Back with me and Katara, we thanked Yugoda for the lesson as the girls took the practice dummy out of the hut.

"It was nothing." Yugoda said to me. "It's not every day you get to teach an Avatar how to heal. You're the first boy I've ever met who wanted to learn from me."

"It was a great pleasure to learn from you, Yugoda." I said to her.

"So who's the lucky boy?" Yugoda asked Katara.

"Huh?" Katara said, confused by the question.

Even I was confused by this.

"Your betrothal necklace." Yugoda said, motioning to Katara's necklace. "You're getting married, right?"

"Ah, no." she calmly said. "I don't think I'm ready yet. My grandmother gave my mother this necklace and my mother passed it down to me."

"I recognize this carving." Yugoda said with surprise, after taking a closer look at the necklace. "I don't know why I didn't realize it sooner. You're the spitting image of Kanna!"

"Wait, how do you know my Gran-Gran's name?" Katara confusedly said, backing away from Yugoda a bit.

"When I was about your age, I was friends with Kanna." Yugoda said. "She was born here in the Northern Tribe."

"She never told me." Katara said, somewhat down casted by this.

"Your grandmother had an arranged marriage with a young Waterbender." Yugoda said. "He carved that necklace for her."

"If Gran-Gran was engaged, why did she leave?" Katara asked.

"I don't know." Yugoda answered. "That's always been a mystery to me. She left without saying goodbye."

Now that was confusing. If Kanna was engaged at the time, why would she leave her home? I know the feeling about not know much of your own family history. It can really come to a blow. Back with Sokka and Seiichi, it was night and they got to the bridge where Yue was waiting for Sokka, looking out into the distance. Seiichi then motioned Sokka to go to her and Sokka scurried over.

"Hi, Princess Yue. I made you something." Sokka said as he showed Yue a roughly-crafted wood carving. "I carved it myself."

"It's a bear." Yue said as she looked at it.

"It's a bear." Yue said as she looked at it.

"Actually, it's supposed to be a fish." Sokka said as he flipped the craving around. "See, it has a fin."

"Oh." Yue said with a depressed look. "I'm sorry. I made a mistake. I shouldn't have asked you to come here."

Yue then turned and ran away, leaving Sokka stunned with shock. Out of anger, he threw the carving into the water. Seiichi then followed Sokka as he walked off in anger. Seiichi was becoming more worried. He didn't like seeing Sokka like this and was now stuck between telling him the truth or letting him being heartbroken. Back at our stay, we watched as Sokka and Seiichi came in with Sokka still angry and Seiichi just worried.

"How's warrior training going?" Katara asked her brother.

Sokka grunted as he kicked his bag and collapsed in depression.

"That bad?" Aang asked.

"No, it's Princess Yue." Sokka said. "I don't get it. One minute she wants to go out with me, and the next, she's telling me to get lost."

I then looked to see Yosuke giving a glare at a nervous Seiichi. This was definitely quite a problem Seiichi got.

"So how's waterbending training?" Seiichi said, trying to change the subject.

"Not so good." I said. "Your master won't teach Katara because she's a girl and I'm not learning from a man who wouldn't teach one friend that's been helping me with waterbending this whole time. Aang's the only one who's been training from him."

"Why not let Aang teach you then?" Sokka suggested.

"Why didn't I think of that?" Katara said, excitedly. "At night, you can teach us whatever moves you learn from Master Pakku! That way, you have someone to practice with and me and Roku get to learn waterbending! Everyone's happy!"

"I'm not happy." Sokka said.

"But you're never happy." Katara said to him.

"Are you sure it's a good idea?" I asked her. "By the way Pakku is, I'm not sure he would like any of this."

"Come one, Roku." Katara said to me. "This could be our only chance to master waterbending. There's no other master we can go to and Pakku won't teach me. Please, Roku."

I then gave it some thought and saw I had no other choice. I wasn't gonna go to Pakku so I had to take this risk.

I sighed and said "Fine. Let's go."

"Great. Come on." Katara said.

We then got near a bridge where no one could see Aang showing us the waterbending techniques.

"Master Pakku said this move is all about sinking and floating." Aang said as he bended some water and gave it to Katara.

"I get it!" she said as she began bending it.

"Okay, Roku." Aang said to me as he bended some more water. "You ready?"

"Ready." I said as I got into stance.

He then sent it over to me and I tried to do the same movement, but it wasn't as easy for me. It was lie the time I tried to balance a large stack of books while I was walking through the streets as a kid. I managed to hear Aang and Katara's laughing in amusement at my attempt. Then suddenly the water that me and Katara had begun moving on their own and flew off.

"That was amazing!" Aang said in surprise.

"That wasn't me." Katara said.

"Uh, guys?" I said nervously as we all looked to see Pakku on the bridge.

It was obvious he caught us as he took the water, froze it, and scattered it as ice shards into the ground.

"I was just showing Roku and Katara a few moves." Aang said, trying to apologize to the waterbending master.

"You have disrespect me, my teachings, and my entire culture." Pakku said to Aang with a stern look.

"I'm sorry, I…" Aang said.

"You are no longer welcome as my student." Pakku said as he then left.

We were all shocked by this. First, he wouldn't teach Katara because of those stupid traditions, now, because Aang only showed us a few moves, he won't even teach him? That wasn't fair. The next morning, me and the gang confronted Arnook, Pakku, and the royal family about what happened last night.

"Aang was trying to help us learn waterbending." I said to Arnook. "Pakku had no right to just disband him like that."

"What do you want me to do?" Arnook asked. "Force Master Pakku to take Aang back as his student?"

"Well, Aang needs to at least learn waterbending before we can move on." I said. "I'm halfway to becoming a full Avatar and Aang only has one element. Please, you need to let Aang learn from Master Pakku. There must be something we can do to change his mind."

"I suspect he might change his mind if your friend swallows her pride and apologizes to him."

"What?" I said, shocked. "Why? What did she do?"

"Your friend has offended Master Pakku." Arnook said. "If you want Aang to learn waterbending, I suggest your friend apologizes for her actions."

"This is ridiculous!" I said. "Katara didn't do anything wrong. She wants to learn waterbending s much as I do. Pakku disrespected her for refusing to teach her. And that's disrespect for me as well. If anyone should apologize, it's him!"

"Fine. I'll do it." Katara said, shocking me.

"Katara, but…" I said.

"It's fine, Roku." Katara said to me. "If this is the only way he'll teach Aang, then I'll do it."

"I'm waiting, little girl." Pakku said as he smiled, waiting for an apology.

"No." Katara said, griping her hands defiantly as the floor began to crack underneath her. "No way am I apologizing to a sour man like you!"

The rupturing ice cause two large pots from afar to shatter from the vibration. That was a reminder to not get on her bad side.

"Uhhh, Katara?" Aang said as he tried to calm her down.

"I'll be outside if you're man enough to face me." Katara said to Pakku.

We were all shocked to see her challenge Pakku like that as she walked away in anger.

"I'm sure she didn't mean that." Aang said with a nervous smile.

"Actually I think she did." I said, just as worried.

We all then went off and caught up with Katara as she walked down those stairs to the battlefield.

"Katara, are you nuts?" I said to her. "You can't fight Pakku!"

"Yeah." Yosuke said. "That's a fight you can't win."

"I know!" Katara said as she took off her coat and toss it to Yosuke, who managed to catch it. "I don't care!"

"You don't have to do this for me." Aang said to her. "I can find another teacher."

"I'm not doing this for you." Katara said as we got to the bottom of the stairs. "Someone needs to slap some sense into that guy."

We then looked to the stairs to see Pakku walking down on them.

"So, you decided to show up?" Katara said as he got over to us.

We then watched as he just walked by us like we weren't there.

"Aren't you gonna fight?" Katara asked.

"Go back to the healing huts with the other women where you belong." Pakku told her without even looking back.

We were all shocked that he said that to her. We then watched as Katara made a water whip and whipped Pakku in the head.

"Oh, no." Yosuke said, just as worried as the rest of us.

"Fine." Pakku said as he turned around. "You want to learn to fight so bad, study closely."

Pakku then bended two water streams from the nearby pools. Katara tried to attack, but Pakku managed to block her with both streams to create a forceful ring of water around Katara and himself.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to hurt you!" I heard Pakku said as the ring got smaller and smaller.

We then watched as Katara broke the ring and sent the water away. The stream ended up hitting Yosuke and sending him flying backward. When Katara ran up to him, Pakku made an ice wall in front of him, one which Katara slid over and landed on the right post of the stairs. Pakku melted his ice wall and then sent a full blast at Katara, but she managed to stop the blast and divert the water away from her. I looked to see she froze her feet to the post.

"You can't knock me down!" Katara said with determination.

Me, the gang, and some of the crowd cheered for Katara as she kept on going.

"Go, Katara!" Aang said as Katara charged at Pakku.

Pakku tried to put up an ice wall, but Katara instantly liquefied it. She tried to land a blow, but Pakku managed to dodge them all. He then bended a stream and lodged her into the pool to his left. The rest of the crowd, which were children, cheered as Katara emerged from the water. She shook her hair out, created a slab of ice, and began sending ice discs at Pakku. He managed to break some, but had to dodge one that nearly hit him in the head. He looked at Katara with irritation as she got out of the pool. She then sent a stream of water at him, but Pakku managed to take the blast and began increasing its power as Katara ran up to him. He then sent the blast at Katara, sending her backwards and shocking me and the group. Katara was on her hands and knees and looked exhausted. But she instantly got back up and tried to send two snow pillars behind Pakku crashing down on him. We then watched as a mist cloud formed around Pakku, leaving us in suspense.

"Well, I'm impressed." Pakku said as the mist cleared. "You are an excellent Waterbender."

"But you still won't teach me, will you?" Katara asked.

"No." Pakku said.

Katara then bended a wave of ice and sent it at Pakku, who dodged it by raising himself on an ice pillar. After liquefying the pillar he rode the wave as he charged at Katara. Katara tried to hit him with a powerful stream, but Pakku dodged it, turned the water into an ice arc, slid on it, and struck Katara down. Katara fell to the ground as Pakku landed on the rim of a pool. Pakku then bended a tower of water and sent it above Katara. He then froze and made it rain ice shards over Katara. Her body was captured in the shards and we were all worried, but were a little relieved when she rose her head and struggled to get free. I didn't think she could take much more of it. Her hair was a mess and she was close to passing out twice.

"This fight is over." Pakku said as he began walking away.

"Get back here!" Katara said as she continued to struggle. "I'm not finished yet!"

"Yes, you are." Pakku said to her.

We then watched and saw something on the ground. I tried to look closer and managed to see he had picked up Katara's necklace.

"This is my necklace." Pakku said as he examined the necklace with realization.

"No, it's not!" Katara said to him. "It's mine! Give it back!"

"I made this sixty years ago for the love of my life…" Pakku said, "for Kanna."

Me and the gang were shocked to see that Pakku was the man Katara and Sokka's grandmother was engaged to.

"My Gran-Gran was supposed to marry you?" Katara surprisingly asked, after melting the ice away.

"Yes." Pakku answered. "I carved this necklace for your grandmother when we got engaged. I thought we would have a long, happy life together. I loved her."

"But she didn't love you, did she?" I said to him, realizing what had happened back then.

"It was an arranged marriage." Katara said. "Gran-Gran wouldn't let your tribe's stupid customs run her life. That's why she left."

"Your grandmother was pretty brave to do that." I said.

We then watched as Yue ran away crying. I knew his was a moment where history had repeated itself.

"Go get her." I said to Sokka and he ran off after her.

I then watched Seiichi give some worried expressions before running after Sokka. Yosuke then began running after him. Later that night, Seiichi searched for Sokka while being chased by Yosuke. With Sokka, he managed to catch up with Yue on a bridge. She stood there as tears continued to fall.

"What do you want?" Yue asked as she noticed Sokka.

"Nothing." Sokka said to her. "I just want you to know I think you're beautiful and I never thought a girl like you would even notice a guy like me."

"You don't understand." Yue said.

When she said that, Seiichi saw them and ran off to tell Sokka the truth while Yosuke chased him. When Seiichi was halfway to Sokka, Yosuke tackled him and they both ended up witnessing the events unfold.

"No, no." Sokka said. "See, that's the thing. I think I do understand now. You're a princess. I'm…I'm just a Southern peasant."

"No, Sokka…" Yue said.

"It's okay. You don't have to say anything." Sokka said as he tried to leave. "I'll see you around, okay?"

Then Yue grabbed Sokka and kissed him, surprising Seiichi and Yosuke as they got up with their jaws dropped.

"Okay, now I'm really confused." Sokka said as they broke the kiss. "Happy, but confused."

"I do like you a lot." Yue said to him. "But we can't be together and not for the reason you think."

"You didn't tell him, did you?" Yosuke said with a glare to Seiichi.

"I was going to." Seiichi said with a worried look.

"Seiichi? Yosuke?" Sokka asked as he turned to see them. "What are you doing here?"

"I'll tell you." Yosuke said. "Seiichi forgot to tell you the one thing about Yue, something that you should've known from the very beginning."

"What are you talking about?" Sokka asked, confused by this.

"Sokka," Yosuke said. "Yue's engaged."

Sokka was shocked by this and looked to Yue to see her lower her collar to reveal her betrothal necklace.

"I'm sorry." Yue said with tears in her eyes before she then ran off, leaving Sokka in disbelief on the bridge with Seiichi and Yosuke who then try to help him through this depressing time.

The next day, me and Aang were training with Pakku. I had a little talk with Pakku and I agreed to be his student as he agreed to my conditions. Me and Aang turned two blobs of water in streams and sent them away. Well, Aang did. Mine went straight in my face.

"Not bad, not bad." Pakku said as he laughed. "Keep practicing and maybe you two will get it by the time you're my age.

"Uh, we only got till the end of summer to master all four elements." I said as Aang turned around in annoyance.

"Hey, Katara!" Aang said with a smile as I turned to see her running up to us.

"What do you think you're doing?" Pakku said to her. After she managed to catch her breath and stood up, he said "It's past sunrise. You're late."

When he got in stance, me, Aang, and Katara then did the same and mimicked his movements as he taught us how to waterbend, the three of us grinning.

"Good to see you here." Aang said to Katara.

"You, too." Katara said to the Airbender.

Now I was finally learning waterbending the way I wanted it: with the friends that helped me so much. I know I got a long way before I can master waterbending, so does Aang. But we'll be able to master this bending and use it to save the world. Right now, I just hope the Fire Nation tried to get at us again before we even get close to waterbending mastery.


	16. Chapter 15: The Siege, Part 1

**Chapter 15: The Siege of the North Pole, Part 1**

It was morning, me, Aang, and Katara continued our lessons with Master Pakku and were now starting battle practice. Katara was up first against another young male student named Sangok. He tried to use an iceball, but Katara melted it and sent a wave at him and froze the water, placing Sangok in a trap.

"Nice try, Pupil Sangok." Pakku said as he walked up to Sangok, who tried to break himself free. "A couple more years and you might be ready to fight a sea sponge." He then freed Sangok from the ice and then looked to the rest of us students. Unlike me, they looked tired and unamused by this. I guess it might be a little embarrassing having their behinds handed to them like that. "Would anyone care for a rematch with Katara?"

"I will." I said, volunteering.

"Very well." Pakku said as I went over to face Katara.

When our fight began, I tried to do my best waterbending, but it wasn't as strong as Katara's. I ended up beaten in only a few seconds.

"Don't worry, pupil Roku." Pakku said to me. "It takes some time to master waterbending, especially for an Avatar born in the Fire Nation. One day, you'll be strong enough to waterbend. Just be patient."

"Thanks, Master Pakku." I said as I got back up.

"Katara, you've advanced more quickly than any student I've ever trained." Pakku said to Katara, making her smile. "You have proven that with fierce determination, passion, and hard work, you can accomplish anything." He then irritably looked at Aang, who was lying on the ground, floating Momo around on an air ball above him. "Raw talent alone is not enough. Pupil Aang!"

"Yes, Master Pakku?" Aang said as he stood up, stopping his bending and letting Momo land on his head.

"Care to step into the sparring circle?" Pakku said, sarcastically. "I figure, sine you've found time to play with house pets, you must have already mastered waterbending."

"Yeah, I've been watching those sparring matches while you've been messing around with Momo." I said to Aang. "Please tell me you've mastered at least half of this."

"I wouldn't say mastered, but check this out." Aang said as he got to his feet.

He then bended the snow and covered himself with it. He was then uncovered when Momo pounced and knocked him down. This wasn't exactly what we had in mind. While I was depressed, Pakku shook his head in disappointment, and Katara looked a little irritated. In another part of the city, Sokka and Yue talked about their tribes, even the living conditions. Even though she was engaged, Sokka still wanted to talk to her. Seiichi and Yosuke were with them to see how well it went. They were walking on a bridge with Sokka walking on the bridge's wall white keeping his balance.

"So they don't have palaces in the Southern Tribe?" Yue asked.

"Are you kidding? I grew up in a block of ice." Sokka said as he sat on the ledge. "It's not exactly a cultural hub."

Yue laughed and placed her hand on Sokka's shoulder. Though when Sokka smiled at her, she pulled back her hand, looking a little worried.

"Sokka, this is wrong." Yue said as she looked at him seriously.

"What's wrong?" Sokka said, unsurely. "We're taking a walk."

"I'm engaged." Yue said, causing Sokka's smile to fade. "It just feels…"

"I know just what you need." Sokka said with a smile, hopping off the rail and going to her side. "You need to meet my good friend, Appa."

"Who?" Yue asked.

They all went to the stables where Appa was resting.

"Appa and I go way back." Sokka said as he faced Appa. "Don't we, boy?"

To his surprise, Appa pinned Sokka and began licking.

"Ah, ah, easy!" Sokka said as Appa continued licking him. "Down, boy! Agh! No, up!"

"Looks like you haven't been giving Appa enough attention!" Yue said as she laughed with Seiichi and Yosuke with Sokka trying to escape Appa's licking.

After Sokka managed to get Appa to stop, the four got onto the saddle with Seiichi and Yosuke sitting in the back and Sokka and Yue sitting up front and Sokka holding the reins.

"So how does this work?" Yue asked.

"You holding on tight?" Sokka said and Yue then nodded "yes." In a cool tone, Sokka then said "Yip…yip."

Then, in an instant, Appa took flight, surprising Yue.

"Oh…my…goodness!" Yue said as Appa flew.

She looked over the saddle as Appa soared over the ocean.

"Wow." She said, impressed by the view. "I can't believe you do this every day."

"Yeah, we pretty much love up here." Sokka said as he stretched.

"Is it always this cold in the sky?" she asked as she moved closer to Sokka.

"Not when you're with someone." Sokka said, happily.

"It's beautiful up here."

"Yeah."

The two Waterbenders then watched in surprise as Sokka and Yue looked like they were about to kiss, until the warrior turned away and pretended to act cool, no doubt still worried of how he would affect Yue's engagement. Yue did the same and pretended it was normal.

"Whoo! Yeah!" Sokka said. "Ahh, good times, good times."

"Hey, look!" Yosuke said as they all looked to see some kind of black snow falling down on them.

"Black snow?" Seiichi asked as he saw the strange snow fall.

"What's happening?" Yue asked, worriedly.

"Oh, no." Sokka said with shock.

They weren't the only ones who saw it. The black snow was pouring all over the city. Most of us were confused by this strange weather pattern. Aang and Katara were more concerned by it. It even turned the water black in a fountain Hiriko and Kioko were near to. Back with Sokka and the others, they landed on the outskirts of the city where the snow had black patches in it.

"What is this?" Seiichi asked.

"Soot." Sokka said as he picked up a handful of the snow.

"What?" Seiichi asked.

"I've seen this before, right before my village was attacked." Sokka said as he put the snow back on the ground and rose up. "It's soot mixed with snow."

"But why's it happening here?" Yosuke asked.

"It's the Fire Nation." Sokka said before he turned to them with concern. "They've closed in on the North Pole."

This shocked the three for their home was about to be attacked. They all then walked over to him.

"How many are there?" Yosuke asked.

"From the looks of this stuff, I'd say there's a lot of them." Sokka said as they looked out into the horizon.

"We got to warn the tribe!" Seiichi said and they went to warn everyone.

After they told us about what was happening, Arnook then had all the citizens retreat to the citadel and all the warriors to prepare for battle. Sokka and Yue managed to get to the steps with Seiichi and Yosuke escorting them, but Yue stopped them when they were halfway there.

"What's wrong?" Sokka asked her as he then motioned to the capital. "We have to go."

"No, Sokka, wait." Yue sadly said as she let go of Sokka's hand. "I can't see you anymore. Not at all."

"What?" Sokka said, confused. "We're just friends."

"I wish we could just be friends, but I like you too much and it's too confusing to be around you." Yue said. "I'm marrying someone else."

She then turned away in sorrow.

"You don't love him, do you?" Sokka said, realizing what was happening to the princess. "You don't even seem to like him."

"But I do love my people." Yue said.

"You're not marrying them." Sokka countered.

"You don't understand." Yue said as she turned to Sokka. "I have duties to my father, to my tribe. I have to do this. Goodbye."

She then ran up the stairs past Sokka, leaving Sokka in dismay.

"Sokka," Seiichi said as Sokka looked to him. "I know Yue would want to do the same as your grandma to not let these rules control her life. But she cares about our home. She might not agree to it, but she needs to do what's best for the tribe. I wish there was another way for you two to be together, I really do. But we can't go against our traditions. We just have to make the best of things. Come on, we need to hear the battle plan."

With that, the three then entered and we were gather into the royal palace as Arnook began his speech with the Northern citizens with Yue and Pakku behind him.

"The day we have feared for so long has arrived." Arnook said. "The Fire Nation is on our doorstep. It is with great sadness I call my family here before me, knowing well that some of these faces are about to vanish from our tribe, but they will never vanish from our hearts. Now, as we approach the battle for our existence, I call upon the great spirits! Spirit of the Ocean, Spirit of the Moon, be with us! I'm going to need volunteers for a dangerous mission."

"Count me in!" Sokka said as he stood up.

"Sokka…" Katara said as most of our group was confused by this.

"I'm in too!" Seiichi said as he stood up.

"I volunteer as well!" Yosuke said doing the same.

"Be warned." Arnook said. "Many of you will not return."

It wasn't long until more men stood up as volunteers, showing they were ready to make the sacrifice.

"Come forward to receive my mark if you accept the task." Arnook said and all the volunteers walked up to him to receive their marks. The mark was three wavy vertical lines on their foreheads.

When Sokka got his, he looked at Yue with a sad look and she looked at him. I managed to see it last a few moments before Sokka turned away and continued walking. Yue closed her eyes as she diverted her gaze from him. Even from a distance, I could still see the tears flowing from her eyes. After that, me and Aang stood outside the citadel, waiting for the first glimpse of a Fire Navy ship.

"The stillness before battle is unbearable." Arnook said as he came over to us. "Such a quite dread."

"The Fire Nation already tried to destroy one nation." I said. "I won't let history repeat itself."

"I wasn't there when the Fire Nation attacked my people." Aang said as Katara joined us, before giving determination to his next set of words. "I'm going to make a difference this time."

After me and the gang joined the warriors on the wall, we all waited for the first ship to appear, ready for battle. Looking out to the distance, I managed to see the first ship. But then something with a bright radiance then appeared and it wasn't long until we saw the ship launched a fireball at us. It hit the wall, sending us all back and damaging the wall. More fireballs came as the Fire Nation began their attack on the tribe. Me, the gang, and the warriors recovered and made sure everyone was okay. When Sokka looked for Katara, we found her after she got rid of the snow pile that buried her. After Sokka got his sister to her feet, we all then watched as Aang went off to stop the ship. Riding on Appa, he went straight toward the ship, knocking a fireball in a cliff near the wall after it was shot at them.

I managed to see Aang hop off Appa and went on to take on the ship by himself. I managed to catch a glimpse of Aang destroying the catapults. I then watch as some of the tribe's ships went off toward the Fire Nation ship. When I looked over, the Waterbenders then uprooted the entire ship with ice, preventing it from advancing any farther. I then watched as Appa took off from the ship with Aang on him. I knew that wasn't the only one. I then took to the sky and was shocked by the hundreds of Fire Navy ships heading towards us.

"Oh, no." I said in fright.

I then went back to tell the others.

"Roku, what's wrong?" Seiichi asked.

"There's more ships coming." I said. "Over a hundred."

This shocked everyone. It seemed impossible to stop them one by one. So we regrouped at the city and tried to defend it from attacks while Arnook prepared some of the soldiers for a different plan.

"Men, you'll be infiltrating the Fire Nation Navy." Arnook said to the warriors. "That means you'll all need one of these uniforms."

Then a young man with black hair and a wolf tail came out with a Fire Nation uniform. By the way Seiichi and Yosuke described it, it was a style that no soldier had used in 80 years. This made Seiichi, Yosuke, and Sokka laughed at it and the other warriors stared at them.

"What's your problem?" the man said.

"Fire Navy uniforms don't look like that." Sokka said.

"Of course they do." The man said, glaring at Sokka. "These are real uniforms captured from actual Fire Navy soldiers."

"When?" Sokka sarcastically asked. "Like, a hundred years ago."

"85." Arnook said.

"Dude, some of our friends are from the Fire Nation and we've seen the Navy." Yosuke said. "That style isn't gonna fool them."

"Yeah. The Fire Nation doesn't wear shoulder spikes anymore." Sokka said as he walked over and flung one of the shoulder spikes with his finger. "The newer uniforms are more streamlined."

The spike bounced back to its original shapes and Seiichi walked over.

"And these helmets are even the same." Seiichi aid as he took the helmet. "They're black with skull masks on them."

"How do we know we can trust these guys?" the man said to Arnook before glaring at Sokka who returns it. "Such bold talk for new recruits."

"Seiichi and Yosuke are members of the North and Sokka is from our sister tribe, Hahn." Arnook said to the man. "They're capable warriors and I value their input."

Hahn glared at Sokka as he gave a smug. Arnook then turned his attention to the other warriors.

"Now, our first objective is to determine the identity of their commanding officer." Arnook said.

"His name is Zhao." Sokka put in as he described Zhao, detailing the side burns with his fingers. "Middle-aged, big sideburns, bigger temper…"

"Sokka, I want you to tell everything you know to Hahn. He's leading the mission." Arnook said to him, before turning to Hahn. "Hahn, show Sokka some respect. I suspect nothing less from my future son-in-law."

Hahn scratched the back of his head as Arnook left the room. He stopped when he noticed Sokka staring at him with his mouth opened in shock. Sokka wasn't the only one for Seiichi and Yosuke looked at Hahn with shock. Yue didn't actually tell them who she was engaged to, only that she got engaged.

"Princess Yue's marrying you?" Sokka asked with a glare, pointing to Hahn.

"Yeah, what of it?" Hahn said to him, irritated.

"Nothing." Sokka said as he turned away with an upset look on his face. "Congratulations."

The battle continued with multiple fireballs coming in left and right. All the Waterbenders tried their best to stop the attacks. This was strange. The attack should've stopped by now. The full moon's rising. From what I read about Waterbenders, they receive their power from the moon. They're at their strongest during a full moon. Firebenders aren't strong enough this far out North, even at night. Why would they keep attacking when they're about to be outmatched? Even with that army, the Waterbenders can easily beat them once the full moon's out. Why would Zhao attack the tribe if it reached to his defeat? Though I then saw the ships stop firing and dock out there in the ocean.

"They've stopped firing." Yue said.

"Of course." I said. "The sun's setting. We Firebenders aren't as strong in the cold, even at night. They'll continue the attack in the morning."

Me, Katara, and Yue were watching from the citadel as the rest of my team protected the city.

"Aang!" Katara said as Aang and Appa flew in, both exhausted.

"I can't do it." Aang said as he got off Appa and laid on his paw. "I can't do it."

"What happened?" Katara said as we came over to him.

"I must have taken out a dozen Fire Navy ships, but there's just too many of them." Aang said.

"We're not doing so good either." I said. "Even with all my team's strength, we can't beat them."

"But you have to." Yue pleaded to us. "You're the Avatars."

"I'm just one kid." Aang said, solemnly.

"I'm sorry, princess." I said to her. "But, to beat them, we're gonna need more power."

I then growled and stomped the ground in frustration, using my strength by accident and leaving my footprint on the ground.

"If only our bending would become stronger like the Waterbenders." I said.

"What do you mean?" Katara asked.

I had to expect this. The South didn't have any Waterbenders besides her, so it stood to reason she didn't know what happened during a full moon. As I explained to Katara what I've known, back with the warrior, Sokka and Hahn were talking as they sharpened their weapons. Seiichi and Yosuke managed to listen in.

"Let me tell you, Sokka." Hahn said, smugly. "I've courted a lot of girls, but Yue's the finest and she comes with the most perks."

"Perks?!" Sokka asked as Seiichi and Yosuke turned to them. "What does that mean?"

"I mean, Yue's nice and everything, but the points I'll gain with the chief aren't bad either." Hahn said, angering Sokka.

"Princess Yue is wasted on a self-absorbed weasel like you." Sokka said.

"Whoa, hang on." Hahn said as Sokka looked away and closed his eyes, his expression showing more anger as Hahn spoke. "What do you care? You're just a simple rube from the Southern Tribe. What would you know of the political complexities of our life." He smirked as he finished with "No offense."

Sokka then glared at Hahn with rage before tackling Hahn. The two Waterbenders watched as the two fought on the ground.

"You're just a jerk without a soul!" Sokka said as he fought with Hahn. "No offense!"

The fight continued until Arnook came in and saw the two warriors pulling each others' wolf tails.

"That's enough!" Arnook said as he broke up the fight. "Sokka, you're off the mission!"

Sokka, with his hair loose and locks hanging in his face, was shocked by this before he crossed his arms in anger. Both Seiichi and Yosuke were also shocked by it and went over to try and talk to Arnook.

"Chief, you can't get rid of Sokka." Seiichi said to Arnook.

"Yeah, we need him." Yosuke said.

"He has given Hahn enough information about the admiral." Arnook said to them. "He has attacked your commanding officer and, as such, must be punished. I'm sorry, but Sokka will not be allowed on the mission with you."

This only displeased them and the two Waterbenders decided to do the only thing they had left.

"If Sokka isn't coming with us…" Seiichi said as Arnook turned to them.

"Then we're not going on this mission either." Yosuke said, shocking everyone.

"Don't mean to be disrespectful, chief." Seiichi said as he and Yosuke went over to stand by Sokka's side. "But we don't go without Sokka."

"Yeah." Yosuke said as the two Waterbenders smiled. "Hahn might be leading the mission, but Sokka's our leader on this."

"You two are seriously giving up protecting our entire tribe for him?" Hahn asked.

"We're only giving up the mission." Yosuke said to him. "We'll stay with Sokka and protect everyone in the city. Honestly, it's better than having to listen to someone like you."

"Watch it, you!" Hahn said as he glared at Yosuke. "I'm going to be the chief of this tribe! You should give me proper respect."

"I got your respect," Yosuke said as he motioned to his foot, "right here on my boot!"

"Why are you giving up everything to follow this guy?" Hahn said. "He's just some idiot from the South!"

"No, he's not!" Seiichi shouted as everyone looked at him. "Now, listen here. Sokka is the bravest, strongest, and most loyal guy I know. He's proven time and again as a great warrior, one better than you."

"Yeah, you don't even care about Yue." Yosuke said. "Only yourself. You're nothing, but a self-centered jerk, who had been insulting Sokka this entire time. You don't deserve to marry Yue."

"You might be marrying Yue, but you're no chief to us." Seiichi said.

"That goes for both of us." Yosuke said and the three then began walking out, showing they were sticking together.

"You didn't have to do that for me." Sokka said. "I know you want to protect your tribe."

"Sokka, we do want to protect our home, but not without you." Yosuke said.

"Yeah, you're the one who helped us through this." Seiichi said. "We're all part of the Water Tribe, whether we're from the North or South. We're in this together."

"Thanks, guys." Sokka said as he smiled in gratitude.

Back with us, I had finished explaining all that I knew about the Waterbenders and how they received greater strength from the moon.

"That's all I know." I said to them. "I could never figure out their connection with the moon."

"Perhaps I can explain." Yue said as we all looked to her. "The legends say the moon was the first Waterbender." We then looked to the sky, seeing the moon begin to rise. "Our ancestors saw how it pushed and pulled the tides and learned how to do it themselves."

"I've always noticed my waterbending is stronger at night." Katara said, remembering how strong she was during the night.

"That explains why Waterbenders are so strong at night." I said.

"Our strength comes from the Spirit of the Moon, our life comes from the Spirit of the Ocean." Yue said. "They work together to keep balance."

That's when I stuck an idea. If those spirits are the source of all waterbending, they could possibly help us.

"The spirits!" I said. "If they were the ones who created waterbending, they might be what we need to save the tribe."

"Yeah!" Aang said as he got up from his slouch, getting the same idea and startling Momo. "Maybe we can find them and get their help."

"How can you do that?" Yue asked.

"The Avatars are the bridge between our world and the Spirit World." I said. "We can go there and talk to the spirits."

"Maybe they'll give you the wisdom to win this battle!" Yue said with some excitement.

"Or maybe they'll unleash a crazy amazing spirit attack on the Fire Nation!" Aang said with the same mood.

When he saw our confused looks, he straightened up and gave a nervous look.

"Or wisdom." Aang said. "That's good too."

"Actually I think the spirits can give me and Aang the strength we need to stop those ships." I said.

"Uh, hate to burst your bubble," Tadaaki said, "but, Roku, you've only been to the Spirit World once."

"And, Aang, the last time you went there was on accident." Katara said. "How are you two gonna get there this time?"

I then began giving some thought. It was quite the conundrum. How exactly was me and Aang gonna get to the Spirit World? We didn't know how we did it the first time.

"I have an idea." Yue said. "Follow me."

Yue then led us to a small, round, wooden door somewhere behind the palace.

"So, is this the way to the Spirit World?" Aang asked as he walked up to the door.

Yue laughed before saying "No. You and Roku will have to get there on your own." She then opened the door to let us into wherever it led. "But I can take you to the most spiritual place in the entire North Pole."

When we went through, we found ourselves in an oasis void of any snow or ice. There was even some grass beyond the lake we were in front of and a waterfall behind it. I was absolutely amazed by this and I wasn't the only one. As the rest of us walked there, Aang ran over to the grass, laughing.

"I never thought I'd miss grass this much!" Aang said, rolling in the grass.

"It's so warm here!" I said as I felt the warmth of the oasis. "How is that possible?"

"It's the center of all spiritual energy in our land." Yue said.

She and Katara removed their coats and embraced the warmth with the others. While they did that, I looked to the pond at the center and saw two koi fish swimming in it. One was black with a large spot on its head and other was the reverse. They were swimming around each other near the edge of the pond. I don't know why, but I was amazed by the way they were. Though I was a little ticked when Momo tried to grab them.

"Momo, stop messing with the fish!" I said as I shooed the lemur away.

"You're right, Yue." Aang said as he stood on the other side of the pond. "I can feel something. It's so…tranquil."

He then went into meditating position. I had to agree. It was like every bit of weight I had on my shoulders was lifted away. I felt…at peace. I then went over and did the same next to Aang. Back with Sokka and the others, they were preparing to defend the tribe from the next attack when Arnook came over to them.

"Is something wrong?" Arnook asked.

"No. We're just getting prepared for tomorrow." Sokka said as he sharpened his boomerang. "Everything's fine."

"Listen to me." Arnook said. "Sokka, I took you off the mission for selfish reasons. I have a special task in mind for you."

"What kind of task?" Sokka asked.

"I want you to guard my daughter, Princess Yue." Arnook said before turning his attention to the two Waterbenders. "You two are welcome to join him if you wish."

"Of course, chief." Seiichi said as he and Yosuke bowed to him.

"It'll be our honor." Yosuke said and they both got up as Sokka stood up.

"Oh. Sure." Sokka said, trying to keep his cool. "That…shouldn't be too hard."

Back with me and the others, me and Aang meditated while the others watched from behind.

"Why are they sitting like that?" Yue asked, quietly.

"They're meditating, trying to cross over to the Spirit World." Katara said at the same volume, but still annoying me and undoubtedly Aang. "It takes all their concentration."

"Is there any way we can help?" Yue asked again.

"You can start by giving us some peace and quiet!" I yelled to them. "Seriously, we can hear every word you're saying!"

"Sorry." Hiriko said as she and the others tried to stay quiet.

Me and Aang calmed down and looked to the pond. We both watched as the two koi fish circled each other. Just by watching them, I was instantly mesmerized. The way they looked and moved reminded me of the yin and yang. In that moment, I closed my eyes. When I opened them, I saw I was still next to Aang, but now we were now in a forest, one I knew too well. Back with the others, they watched as my eyes Aang's eyes and tattoos lit up in a white light.

"Are they okay?" Yue said worried about me and Aang.

"They've crossed into the Spirit World." Tadaaki said. "They'll be fine as long as we don't move their bodies. They're their only way back to the physical world."

"Maybe we should get some help." Yue said as she tried to go for help.

"Hey, don't worry." Tadaaki said, stopping her. "As long as we're around, nothing will happen to them."

"He's right." Katara said, smiling. "They're our friends. We're perfectly capable of protecting them."

"Well, aren't you a big girl now." Zuko said sarcastically as everyone turned to see him on the bridge.

"Oh, no." Katara said in worry.

"Zuko." Tadaaki said with shock.

"Yes." Zuko said with determination. "Hand them over and I won't have to hurt you."

Yue fled the oasis as the others tried to protect me and Aang. Zuko tried to blast them, but Katara created water shields to block them and managed to send a stream at the Firebender, pushing him back and knocking him to the ground.

"I see you've learned a new trick, but I didn't come this far to lose to you." Zuko said as he got back up.

He then went on the attack. It ended when Katara froze Zuko's feet and trapped him in a sphere of ice. The others congratulated her as she smiled.

"You little peasant." Zuko said from within the sphere. "You've found a master, haven't you?"

Katara and the others watched as the orb glowed orange as Zuko used his firebending to break it. He then went on the attack after being freed. Katara blocked the blasts and the four got ready to attack him, but Zuko managed to slip pass them and tried to grab me and Aang. But Tadaaki shot a boulder at him and Hiriko airbended him into the side of the cliff, where Katara sent a wave of water and froze it, encasing the prince in ice. They then looked to see the sun rising and its light illuminating them.

"Uh-oh." Tadaaki said, knowing this meant Zuko was at his strongest.

Zuko rose his head and, with determination, melted the ice away. He then managed to blast the four of them before they could block his attack. Hiriko was the only one who stayed awake enough to see Tadaaki and Kioko knocked out on the ground, Katara unconscious in front of the gate, and Zuko taking me and Aang.

"You rise with the moon…" Zuko said to Katara. "I rise with the sun."

Zuko then looked down as something grabbed his ankle and saw a weakened Hiriko looking at him with pleading eyes.

"Please, Zuko…" Hiriko said to him. "They're still in the Spirit World. If you take their bodies, they'll be trapped there."

"I'm sorry." Zuko said as he turned away from her, making her let go of his ankle. "I can't go home without them."

Hiriko then fell unconscious as Zuko ran off. When she awoke, Katara and the others were awake and had worried looks on their faces.

"Hiriko, where's Zuko?" Tadaaki asked.

"Where's Aang and Roku?" Katara asked.

"He took them." Hiriko said as she got to her knees. "Zuko's got them."

They looked to see Momo looking sorrowfully from the edge of the pond. They then looked to see Yue, Seiichi, Yosuke, and Sokka appear on Appa. Yue managed to tell them what happened and the four went off to help.

"What happened?" Sokka said as he and the others came over. "Where's Zuko?"

"It's too late." Tadaaki said. "He's gone. And he took Roku and Aang right from under us."

"Where did they go?" Sokka asked as they all had sorrowful looks.

This situation just turned from bad to worse. Me and Aang still haven't found the spirits, we don't have a way back, our team doesn't know where we are, the Fire Nation's invading North, and Zuko haves us in custody. How are supposed to escape Zuko's capture and save the Northern Tribe?


	17. Chapter 16: The Siege, Part 2

**Chapter 16: The Siege of the North Pole, Part 2**

It was morning, the siege continued as the Fire Nation laid waste to the Northern Water Tribe. This was now a dark hour. Zuko managed to capture me and Aang, no one knew where he took us, me and Aang were still in the Spirit World, and the Fire Nation was about to destroy the Northern Water Tribe. The group was still at the oasis, depressed for what happened.

"I can't believe I lost him." Katara said, kneeling sorrowfully.

"Can't believe we let Zuko take them." Tadaaki said, scowling at the ground.

"You did everything you could." Seiichi said. "No one can put you at fault for this."

"Yeah." Sokka said. "Now we need to do everything we can to get them back." He then looked to Katara who looked up at her brother with tears in her eyes. "Zuko can't have gotten far. We'll find him. Aang and Roku will be fine."

"Okay." Katara said, wiping the tears from her eyes.

As they mounted Appa, Momo remained in his spot and turned his head to look at them.

"It's all right." Katara said to the lemur. "You stay here, Momo, in case Aang and Roku come back."

"Yip, yip." Sokka said as they went off to find Zuko, leaving Momo in the oasis.

Back with me and Aang, we were searching the forest looking for a way to find the spirits."

"So, what are we looking for again?" Aang asked as we searched.

"The dragon spirit." I said. "If anyone would know about the Spirits of the Moon and Ocean, it's him."

"How do you know?" Aang asked.

"Because it was the one that told me you returned." I said.

It was long until we heard someone saying "Ohm." We looked to a wooden gate to see a monkey wearing a monk robe sitting underneath it in meditating stance. No doubt it was a spirit so we went over to it to talk to it.

"Um, excuse me?" I said to the spirit. "Sorry to disturb you. I was just wondering if you've seen a dragon spirit go by."

"Go…away." The spirit said as he kept his eyes closed. After a moment, he opened his right eye. "You're still here?"

"Yes, we need…" I said.

The spirit interrupted me by repeating his mantra louder. For a spirit, he wasn't very helpful to us at all.

"Perhaps that thing will help you." The spirit said as he pointed to a strange blue light. "Chase it."

It was better than talking to a nonconsenting spirit, so me and Aang chased it. We followed that light until Aang managed to catch it when we got on a tree branch. When the branch snapped, we landed in a pond next to the tree and the light escaped Aang's grasp.

"Come back!" Aang said as the light flew off.

Then it went over to the side of the pond and changed form. In its place was an old Waterbender I knew to well as he smiled at us.

"Hello again, Roku." He said to me as I smiled at him.

"Oogway!" I said. "You're here!"

"Yes." Oogway said. "And I'm not the only one."

He pointed down to the water. We looked down and I saw Aang's reflection change into Roku.

"Hello, Aang." The reflection said.

"Roku." Aang said in surprise.

I was surprised as well. We were here with the Avatar duo before Aang.

"Roku, Oogway, the Water Tribe's under attack." I said to them. "We need to find the Spirits of the Ocean and the Moon."

"The Ocean and the Moon are ancient spirits." Roku said as he popped out of the reflection. "They crossed over the Spirit World to the mortal world very near the beginning."

"Roku, I don't think the boy was finished." Oogway said before turning to me. "I suspect that you're searching for a way to find them, yes?"

"Yes. We're here to search for the dragon spirit that told me of Aang's return." I said.

"The spirit you speak of is Unmei, the Dragon of Destiny." Oogway said. "He is a _hogosha_ , a guardian spirit. As such, he only appears when he is needed. He is the only spirit old enough to remember that can help you."

"Do you know where he is?" I asked.

"Indeed." Oogway said. "He resides in the territory of a spirit just as old as he is, but he is very dangerous."

"Who?" Aang asked.

"The spirit's name is Koh." Roku answered. "They call him the Face Stealer." Me and Aang were horrified by that. "When crossing into his territory, you must be very careful to show no emotion at all. Not the slightest expression or he will come and steal your face."

Though we were scared of it, we understood the situation, took serious expressions, and nodded. With this, we then went off to find Koh's territory. While we searched, I told Aang about Azula, how she was adored by many and was a firebending prodigy. Everything seemed to come easy for her. I even told Aang that Zuko said his father told him she was born lucky and that he was lucky to be born. Even though she was adored by the people, he was a real pain which was one of the reasons I left: to get away from her. We managed to find it at a giant tree with a cave with walls made from its own root. We were about to head in when we heard a noise and looked to see what appeared to be a curly tailed, blue nose monkey. We both sighed in relief.

"It's just a curly tailed blue nose." Aang said.

When it turned, we screamed for it had no face. No doubt Koh stole it.

"This is Koh's place." I said.

We both then calmed down and repeated Roku's words. "Show no fear. Show no emotion at all."

With that, we then entered the cave, both of us with straight faces. Once we were in, we then began looking for Unmei.

"Hello?" Aang said, unsurely. "We're looking for a spirit named 'Unmei.'"

"Aang, shhh!" I said, quietly. "We don't want to attract Koh. I read about him. One of your previous incarnations tried to hunt him down and kill him."

"I didn't know that." Aang said, confused. "Why?"

"Because Koh stole the face of his love." I said.

Suddenly we were wrapped by something. It looked like a giant black centipede. I looked in front of us and saw a big eye-like bulge that had a white face with red lips on it smiling at us.

"Welcome!" it said.

"Koh." I said as I recognized the creature.

"My old friends, the Avatars." Koh said. "It's been a long time."

"So you know who we are." I said.

"How could I forget…" Koh said as some kind of membrane covered his face and removed itself like a blinking eye, revealing the face of a middle-aged, long mustached man with thick eyebrows and a beard. "…you? Your grandfather and your friend's previous life tried to _slay_ me nearly eight or nine hundred years ago." He then switched to a brown haired woman with a scared look, which I knew had to be the face of Kuruk's love, Ummi. "All because I stole the face of someone he loved."

He had us look at Ummi's face for a moment before giving a malicious smile and switching to the face of that monkey we saw while laughing.

"Enough games, Koh." I said to him. "You need to take us to Unmei now."

"Fine. I will…" Koh said, tightening the wrap. "After I take your faces for trying to kill me."

"Koh, enough!" a voice said, one I already knew.

We all then looked to see Unmei come in and tackle Koh, freeing me and Aang. After that, Unmei then went over to us and circled us, shielding us from Koh as he glared at Koh.

"Unmei, do not interfere." Koh said as he went to the _hogosha_.

"Koh, these Avatars are intertwined by a destiny you cannot cease from continuing." Unmei said to Koh. "As the guardian, I cannot allow anything to interfere with destiny, especially you."

"How could these two ever become so important?" Koh asked. "With such…young faces?"

"The Avatars have an important duty to keep balance in both the mortal world and the Spirit World." Unmei said. "If you want to even live to see another day, then I suggest you leave."

The two glared at each other for a moment of time before Koh changed to his white face and began to back away.

"As you wish…brother." Koh said as he then left.

Both me and Aang were shocked by this. This was why Unmei kept his face. It was because he and Koh were…brothers. Who would have ever thought that the Face Stealer and the Dragon of Destiny were brothers? Unmei then looked at us calmly as his body loosely circled us.

"Avatars, why are you here?" Unmei asked us.

"Unmei, we need your help." I said to him. "We need to find the Moon and the Ocean."

"Their names are Tui and La, push and pull." Unmei said. "And that has been the nature of their relationship for all time."

"Please. Help us find them." Aang said. "An entire culture could be destroyed if we don't get their help."

"Oh, you think you need their help." Unmei said as he looked to the side. "Actually, it's the other way around." Then, in an instant, he turned and bolted at us, stopping just only a short way from us. We closed our eyes as he then shouted "Someone's going to kill them!"

We then opened our eyes and looked at Unmei as he went to his original distance.

"What do you mean?" I asked. "How can we find them and protect them?"

"You've already met them, actually." Unmei answered, turning his back to us. "Tui and La, your moon and ocean, have always circled each other in an eternal dance. They balance each other. Push and pull, life and death, good and evil, yin and yang."

I then realized what he was talking about. We did meet them, in the oasis. That's why it was so warm. It had two great spirits in it. The two beings I saw that reminded me of the yin and yang were the spirits we were looking for. Tui and La were…

"The koi fish!" me and Aang excitedly said to each other at the same time, realizing we both already found the spirits.

Unmei looked back at us quickly as we then gave serious looks.

"We have to get back." I said.

"Hurry before it's too late." Unmei said to us.

As he took to the sky, we then ran off to save Tui and La before it was too late. We then stopped as we saw Roku on the ground.

"The spirits are in trouble." Aang said to him. "We need to get back to the physical world."

"A friend is here to guide you back." Roku said.

He then disappeared and the reflection of a certain black and white bear appeared.

"Hei Bai!" me and Aang said excitedly as we turned to see the spirit.

We then got on him and began riding to where we were when we got there. We managed to get there. Now all we needed to do was figure out how to get back.

"This is where we came in." I said as me and Aang got off Hei Bai. "But how do we get back?"

Then Hei Bai got on his hind legs and sent an energy beam at us. After it disappeared, we were back at the oasis. We looked to see Momo, but he was lying there asleep and he didn't move when Aang said his name. It was when we looked at each other that we both saw we were spirits.

"Oh, no." I said as we looked at ourselves. "Where are our bodies?"

Then, in an instant, the energy began carrying us off somewhere in the icy North, no doubt to our bodies. Back with the others, they were still searching for us when our spirits went over them and into a cave.

"Look!" Katara said as she and the others looked to our spirits. "That's gotta be Aang and Roku!"

With that, they then followed our spirits to the cave. Back with us, we got to our proper bodies and soon found ourselves tied together.

"Welcome back." Zuko said as we turned to see him.

"Zuko, you got to let us go." I said to him. "The Northern Water Tribe is danger."

"I already know." Zuko said. "The attack is happening right now."

"No, that's not what I meant." I said. "The Spirits of the Moon and Ocean are in danger. Someone is about to kill them. We need to save them."

"You're lying." Zuko said.

"I'm not lying." I said.

"Of course, you are. You'd say anything to escape."

"Zuko, look at me. You're my best friend. We've known each other since we were kids. I would never lie to you. You need to believe me. If we don't get back to the oasis, the world will lose its moon and oceans. Zuko, please."

I had pleading eyes when I said that. Zuko gave some thought before taking action. He then untied us and I thanked him for it. With that, we reunited with the others.

"Aang!" Katara said as she hugged the Airbender."

My team was about to attack Zuko, but I told them he was with us. They then lowered their guard and got over to me.

"You okay?" Tadaaki asked.

"Just fine." I said. "But we need to get to the oasis. The spirits are in trouble!"

With that, we all got on Appa and rushed back to the tribe. But we were too late as we all saw the moon turn red as blood, causing a lunar eclipse. I could feel it. Tui was in trouble. It felt like someone put a thorn in my head. I wasn't the only one who felt it. So did Aang and, strangely, Yue. The three of us held our heads in pain.

"Are you okay?" Sokka said, concerned for her.

"I feel faint." Yue answered.

"We feel it too." I said for both me and Aang. "The Moon Spirit is in trouble."

"I owe the Moon Spirit my life." Yue said.

"What do you mean?" Sokka asked.

"When I was born, I was very sick and very weak." Yue said. "Most babies cry when they're born. But I was born as if I were asleep, my eyes closed. Our healers did everything they could. They told my mother and father I was going to die. My father pleaded with the spirits to save me. That night, beneath the full moon, he brought me to the oasis and placed me in the pond. My dark hair turned white, I opened my eyes, and began to cry. And they knew I would live. That's why my mother named me Yue, for the moon."

"That explains the white hair and how you can feel the spirit's pain." I said. "Tui must have given you some of its life force. You have a piece of the Moon Spirit."

"How do you know what it's called?" Yosuke asked.

"Unmei, the dragon spirit, revealed the true identities of the Spirits of the Moon and Ocean, Tui and La." I said. "They came to the mortal realm long ago."

"So where are they?" Seiichi asked.

"In the oasis' pond." I said. "The spirits are the koi fish."

We managed to get to the oasis entrance and got in to see Zhao holding a bag with something struggling in it. There was no doubt that was Tui.

"I am…a legend now." Zhao said as he held the bag. "The Fire Nation will, for generations, tell stories about the great Zhao, who darkened the moon. They will call me 'Zhao the Conqueror', 'Zhao the Moon Slayer', 'Zhao the Invincible!'" then Momo jumped on him and attacked him, trying to save the Moon Spirit. "Ugh! Get it off! Get it off!"

Momo then flew over to Aang as Zhao looked to see me, the gang, Sokka, Katara, and Aang ready ourselves for battle.

"Don't bother." Zhao said as he lifted the sac up and pulled his fist back, threatening to kill Tui.

We then broke our stance and showed we surrendered.

"Zhao, don't!" I said as I put my hands up in surrender.

"It's my destiny to destroy the moon and the Water Tribe." Zhao said.

"Destroying the moon won't hurt just the Water Tribe." I said to him. "It will hurt everyone, including you. Without the moon, everything would fall out of balance. You have no idea what kind of chaos that would unleash on the world."

"He is right, Zhao." Iroh said as we all turned to see him standing fat to my left wearing a cloak.

"General Iroh." Zhao said to him, calmly. "Why am I not surprised to discover your treachery?"

"I'm no traitor, Zhao." Iroh said as he took off his hood. "The Fire Nation needs the moon too. We all depend on the balance. Whatever you do to that spirit, I'll unleash on you ten-fold! Let it go now!"

I then watched as Zhao placed Tui back into the pond. As the two spirits restarted their dance, the moon returned to its original color. But then Zhao unleashed a large fire slash on the pond. All of us opposite to him stood back as the flames came over to the other side. When I looked to the sky, the moon completely vanished, leaving the sky completely colorless. He killed it. He killed Tui. Iroh tried to attack Zhao, defeating four soldiers that were with him, but Zhao managed to escape. I then watched as Zuko then went after Zhao, leaving only the rest of us at the oasis. We gathered around in disbelief and sorrow as Iroh picked up the dead koi.

"It's gone." Yosuke said as he inspected the fish.

"There's no hope now." Yue said as she stood next to Sokka. "It's over."

I kinda blacked out at that point, but the others told me that me and Aang went into the Avatar State and spoke with different voices to our own.

"No." we said at the same time. "It's not over."

Then me and Aang went to the center of the pond and, back to back, stood in meditative stance as La circled us. When we were walking into it, Katara tried to stop us, but Iroh stopped her and they all watched as a new event unfold before them. It wasn't long until the whole pond lit up in a white light. Then, in an instant, both me and Aang descended into the water. Then all of the water in the oasis began to become cover in blue vein-like energy. It happened all over the city. Even though I don't remember it happening, I could still remember the feeling. It was La. What Zhao did angered it and would now punish the Fire Nation for this crime. Then, in an instant, the water formed into a giant fish-like being with me and Aang at the center of it. We were actually controlling it. This was La's true form. For what they did to Tui, La was willing to help us stop the Fire Nation.

In so, it then allowed me and Aang to use its powers. Me and Aang were combined with La. Hiriko, Tadaaki, and Kioko were able to witness as me, Aang, and La went through the city, getting rid of the Fire Nation soldiers. The people of the tribe bowed as we passed by. We were heading straight to the ships. I wished I was able to remember that amazing waterbending. While we did that, Hiriko and Tadaaki were able to see a battle between Zuko and Zhao. Zhao told Zuko he tried to have the prince killed for being the Blue Spirit and freeing me and Aang. Zuko said he didn't have a choice, but Zhao said he should've chosen to accept his failure, that he was a disgrace and at least lived to tell about it. Back at the oasis, Iroh placed Tui back in the water, trying to revive the spirit.

"It's too late." Katara said. "It's dead."

She and the others looked down in sorrow until Iroh noticed Yue.

"You have been touched by the Moon Spirit." Iroh said to the princess. "Some of its life is in you."

"Yes, you're right." Yue said, revealing it. "It gave me life. Maybe I can give it back."

"No!" Sokka said as he tried to stop her, grabbing her hand. "You don't have to do that."

"It's my duty, Sokka." She said to him.

"I won't let you!" Sokka said. "Your father told me to protect you."

"I have to do this." Yue said.

She managed to slip her hand out of Sokka's and then placed her hands on Tui and returned its life force, the fish glowing and Yue closing her eyes. When she was done, the glow disappeared and she fell back.

"No!" Sokka said as he caught her.

"Princess Yue!" Seiichi and Yosuke said as they gathered around Sokka.

"She's gone." Sokka said after checking for any life in Yue. "She's gone."

Everyone gave looks of depression as Sokka held Yue close. Back with me, Aang, and La, we made it to the ocean and attacked them, destroying them. Back at the oasis, Yue's lifeless body disappeared, surprising everyone. After she does, Tui began to glow and Iroh placed it back into the water. The entire pond began to glow and Yue, now a spirit, appeared above it. She went over and gently held Sokka's head as she spoke.

"Goodbye, Sokka." Yue said to the warrior. "I'll always be with you."

They shared one last kiss before she disappeared. They all looked to the sky as the moon returned, the sky now blue once again. La saw the moon had returned and began to return to the oasis, leaving Aang on the wall as he exited the Avatar State. With Zuko and Zhao, they were fighting on a bridge here Zhao got the upper hand, but stopped his attack when he saw the moon was back in the sky.

"It can't be!" Zhao said, shocked by this.

He didn't notice, but I, still fused with La, appeared behind him and waterbended a hand to grab him. Zhao was then beginning to be consumed by the water as he was dragged into the water.

"Take my hand!" Zuko said as he offered his hand to help Zhao.

Zhao considered before retracting his hand, rejecting the offer. The hand disappeared into the water with Zhao and the energy I was surrounded in them place me gently on the bridge and then disappeared into the water. I was unconscious when Zuko, Hiriko, and Tadaaki gathered up around me. When I woke up, I stood up with a massive headache and out of the Avatar State.

"Oh, my head!" I groaned as I rubbed my head. "What happened?"

"You and Aang saved the tribe and you took down Zhao." Tadaaki said.

"Really?" I asked.

"Yeah. You did." Zuko said as he smiled at me.

I returned it as now the battle was over. We managed to get Zuko and Iroh out of the city and onto a ship before any of the tribe got to them. The next morning, me, Katara, and most of my team were with Pakku as he then made an announcement that shocked us.

"I've decided to go to the South Pole." Pakku said. "Some other benders and healers want to join me. It's time we helped rebuild our sister tribe."

"What about Aang and Roku?" Katara said as we then looked to Aang standing in the distance with Momo. "They still need to learn waterbending."

"Well," Pakku said as he turned to her. "They better get used to calling you Master Katara."

Katara smiled gratefully at Pakku for allowing her to teach me and Aang. She was now a waterbending master. How cool is that?

"Thank you for everything, Master Pakku." I said as I bowed to him.

"It was no trouble at all." Pakku said to me. "If it's any constellation, I think you'll make a great Avatar."

"Thank you. That means a lot." I said. "Though I wish I could've been able to…"

"Roku, look!" Katara said as she pointed to my left.

I looked there to see some snow floating in the air, right at the same level as I lifted my hand at my left shoulder. I instantly dropped my hand and the snow instantly dropped to the ground.

"Roku, did you just…?" Aang asked as he came over with Momo on his shoulder.

I then lifted my hand again and saw the snow lifting up again. I brought it to me and melted it into water. I smiled as I knew there was no doubt I was actually doing it.

"Ha, ha! Look at that!" I laughed in excitement. "I'm waterbending! I'm really waterbending!"

"But…how?" Katara said, just as surprised as Aang to see me doing this.

"It appears you truly are special." Pakku said with smile. "You have been blessed by the Ocean Spirit, giving you the power of water." He then looked to Katara. "And it will be your job to teach him to control that power."

"I'll do my best." Katara said.

She and Aang smiled happily at me as I then began to bend the water. With Seiichi and Yosuke, they were with Sokka and Arnook after they explained what happened to Yue. Arnook then told them he knew Yue would sacrifice herself and Seiichi asked how he knew for it confused him and the others. They looked to the setting moon as he began to explain.

"The spirits gave me a vision when Yue was born." Arnook said to them. "I saw a beautiful, brave, young woman become the Moon Spirit." He sighed before he finished. "I knew this day would come."

"And now Yue is our moon." Seiichi said as they kept looking at the moon.

"She gave her life to save the tribe she loved." Yosuke said. "Now she will continue to protect us as our guiding light in the darkness of night."

"You must be so proud." Sokka said to Arnook.

"So proud…" Arnook said. "And sad."

Back with us, I was still bending the water. I then tried that ice capture move, but got my feet trapped instead. I managed to bend the ice off and me, Katara, and Aang shared a laugh as Aang stood next to Katara. After we stopped laughing, I then watched as Katara and Aang embraced each other in a hug. I then went over and hugged the both of them. I then looked to Momo as he looked at us, curious.

"You too, Momo." I said as we broke the hug with me standing to Aang's right and Katara closely to his left.

"Come here." Aang said and Momo jumped on and rested on Aang's left shoulder. I then felt a hand on my right shoulder and looked to see Sokka, Seiichi, and Yosuke giving me grateful smiles. I then looked to the right and saw and saw Tadaaki and the others doing the same as they joined us. As Appa came over with everything packed on his saddle, we looked off to the ocean and the moon as a new day would begin along with the next part of our journey. Now that both me and Aang had the ability to waterbend, we can both learn to fully master it. Once we do, we'll then go to Omashu and begin our training with Bumi and learn earthbending. After we do, I'll finally become a true Avatar and we'll search the land for a firebending master for Aang. That night showed us that no matter what they throw at us, we will defeat the Fire Nation and end this war.

I know this for our friends believe in us to restore balance and save our home. And I believe…me and Aang will save the save the world.

 **Chronicles of Ichiro: Chapter 1**

Today is a special day. Me, my minions, and Azula had been called to Ozai's royal chamber for a word from the Fire Lord himself. Within his chamber, he spoke as the fires of his immensity raged from in front of him.

"Iroh is a traitor and your brother is a failure." Ozai said to Azula. "I have a task for you." He then looked to me. "And I hope you and your warriors are up to the task in helping her, Ichiro."

"I assure you," I said as I raised my head with a smile, "whatever you have planned for us, none of us will fail you, Lord Ozai."

I looked to Azula to see she had the same smile I had. This was a great day to receive a great task from the Fire Lord. By the way he said it, Zuko has failed in capturing the Avatars. If it had anything to do with that, I'll be glad to take it. It will give me a chance at that red rat I heard about. And it'll be a great honor to bring Ozai the Fire Dragon's head with or without his body.


End file.
